Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation announces 2023 prize shortlist

Michael at Home, Portland, Oregon, USA, May 2015. © Bieke Depoorter/Magnum Photos.

The four shortlisted artists will each receive £5,000 and their work will be exhibited at The Photographers’ Gallery, London. An overall winner will be announced in mid-2023

Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation has today announced the four artists shortlisted for this year’s Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize: Bieke Depoorter, Samuel Fosso, Arthur Jafa and Frida Orupabo. Each artist will receive £5,000 and will take part in the prize’s annual exhibition at The Photographers’ Gallery, London, opening in March 2023.

Originally established in 1996, the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize identifies and rewards artists and their projects considered to have made the most significant contribution to photography over the previous 12 months. From the four shortlisted artists, an overall winner will be announced on 11 May 2023 and will be awarded a £30,000 prize.

Brett Rogers, Director of The Photographers’ Gallery, was one of five judges who selected this year’s shortlisted artists, alongside Thyago Nogueria, Head of Contemporary Photography at Instituto Moreira Salles, Brazil and Natalie Herschdorfer, Director of Photo Elysee, Switzerland. Rogers said: “Our shortlist for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2023 exemplifies photography’s resounding power and resonance right now. Each artist addresses subjects which drive forward debate about the nature of the medium and the role it plays in history and society.”

Bieke Depoorter was shortlisted for her exhibition A Chance Encounter, which took place at C/O Berlin from 30 April – 07 September 2022. The exhibition, made up of installations, projections, film and photography, blurs the traditional relationship between photographer and subject, presenting two unfolding, ongoing, bodies of work, Agata and Michael. Samuel Fosso was selected for his exhibition Samuel Fosso at the Maison Européenne de la Photographie, Paris, from 10 November 2021 – 13 March 2022. The retrospective traced a career of almost 50 years, exploring Fosso’s practice across self portraiture and performative photography, through which he embodies a powerful way of existing in the world and a vivid demonstration of photography’s role in the construction of myths.

Meanwhile, Arthur Jafa was chosen for his exhibition Live Evil at Luma, Arles from 14 April – 13 November 2022. The show draws upon a substantial archive of film and still images, creating visceral, dynamic films and room-sized installations, throughout which Jafa derives power from astute juxtaposition and lyrical, syncopated editing. Finally, Frida Orupabo was shortlisted for her exhibition I have seen a million pictures of my face and still I have no idea, which took place at Fotomuseum Winterthur from 26 February – 29 May 2022. The sculptural collages and digital works of Orupabo are multi-layered formations, exploring questions of race, sexuality and identity, through which the artist and sociologist, grounds her inquiry in her own experience of cultural belonging.

Reflecting on the debate sparked by this year’s range of “exceptional” submissions, Anne-Marie Beckmann, Director of the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation, said: “Together, this shortlisted group of extraordinary artists shows us new and challenging ways to look at the world around us, addressing both personal and universal perspectives.”

The work of shortlisted artists will be on show at The Photographers’ Gallery from 11 March – June 2023. A winner will be announced on 11 May 2023.