ANKARA (AA) – Anadolu Agency opened on Tuesday the first exhibition of photographs featured at the recently-held Istanbul Photo Awards 2016.
The exhibition consists of 30 photographs selected by a jury of international professionals for the Second Istanbul Photo Awards.
Bringing together pictures that depict key events from around the world, the display will be open until May 1.
Addressing the opening ceremony, Anadolu Agency’s deputy Director General and Editor-in-Chief Metin Mutanoglu said that most photographs featured at the competition were about the ongoing war in Syria.
“As the voice of this region, Anadolu Agency makes its presence felt in the international arena with this competition,” Mutanoglu said.
He added that a photograph showing the desperation of a child in a Syrian hospital was the best way to explain to the whole world about the situation in the war-torn country.
Anadolu Agency Visual News Editor-in-Chief Ahmet Sel said the exhibition will be held in other Turkish cities as well as other countries.
Sel said the photographs in the exhibition depicted key stories affecting the world today, including the ongoing clashes in the Syrian city of Aleppo, refugees crossing the Aegean Sea, the east Ukraine conflict and sports-related events.
Among the jury members of Istanbul Photo Awards 2016 were Shanghai Center of Photography Director Liu Heung Shing, Getty Images executive Georges De Keerle, AFP Photo Business Development Director Michel Scotto as well as Guillaume Herbaut, a World Press Photo prizewinner.
An image of refugees taken by Russian photojournalist Sergey Ponomarev, which had won an award at the Istanbul Photo Awards, later also won the Pulitzer Prize this year.
Ponomarev’s image had captured the struggle of Syrian refugees for The New York Times. He won the Photo of the Year 2016 award at the Anadolu Agency-organized competition in the Single News category.
