World Press Photo ’08 opens in Manila

The Manila leg of the World Press Photo Exhibition formally opened Aug. 1 at The Podium in  Ortigas, where it will be on view until Aug. 7. The exhibition will then travel to two other venues for the rest of the 22-day exhibit.

Michiel Munneke, managing director of the Amsterdam-based World Press Photo, introduced the exhibit’s centerpiece, a photo taken by British photojournalist Tim Hetherington showing an American soldier resting at a bunker in Afghanistan.  It was awarded Photo of the Year in the 2007 World Press Photo Competition.

The photo bested about 80,536 photographs submitted to the competition by 5,019 photographers from 125 countries. It was carried by the Vanity Fair.

In his speech, Munneke quoted Hetherington’s description of himself: “I’m more interested in documentary, and documentary as related to photojournalism… But I’m a storyteller.”
 
The World Press Photo competition and the traveling exhibition of the winning works serve to set the standard for the best kind of storytelling, Munneke said.

“Some of the pictures (in the exhibition) are confronting and hard to look at,” Munneke explained. But these are actual shots that tell the story.

Fr. Bienvenido Nebres, Ateneo de Manila University president, said in his welcome remarks that he was pleased that the exhibit would go to different parts of Manila. “Photojournalism speaks a language that touches not just the head but our being… It is our hope that it (exhibition) is one to inspire many young people,” Fr. Nebres said.
 
Robert Brinks, ambassador to Manila of the Kingdom of the Netherlands , said the exhibition of the news photos served an important purpose for journalism and its audiences: “They (photos) likewise remind us of the great lengths that the press and photojournalists go to to bring us news.” 

After The Podium, the exhibit, featuring about 200 photos, will move to the SM Mall of Asia, Aug. 8-13, and The Block SM North-EDSA, Aug. 14-22.

A partnership project of the Konrad Adenauer Asian Center for Journalism at the Ateneo de Manila University (ACFJ) and the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the show has also drawn support from The Podium, SM Supermalls and Unilever Philippines.


|  MORE NEWS  |  HOME  |  ARCHIVE  |



Photos courtesy of Jimmy Domingo, ACFJ Special Coordinator for Diploma in Photojournalism