Daniel Blau announces winners of 5 Under 30 competition

Daniel Blau has announced the names of the winning photographers in 5 Under 30, its inaugural photography competition for young photographers.

The photographers include 27-year-old Marianne Bjørnmyr, 29-year-old Madoka Furuhashi, 26-year-old Andi Schmied, 22-year-old Tereza Cervenova, and 25-year-old Lara Morrell.

London-based Morrell, who is completing her MA in photography at Central Saint Martins, was recognised for her project Christ Stopped at Novoli, which was featured in BJP’s April issue.

The project’s title is a play on Christ Stopped at Eboli, the title of a memoir by activist and writer Carlo Levi, in which he gives an account of his political exile from Mussolini’s regime in Southern Italy.

“I’m overjoyed and honoured to be selected by such a highly regarded gallery,” says Morrell. “This series is a surreal embodiment of my time in exile on a farm in a remote village in Southern Italy. I was working with the land and surrounded by Catholic values, which continue to play an integral part in people’s lives in these regions. I chose to recreate the apostles, each with their attributes of martyrdom.”

Photographers could enter between eight and 10 images on any theme, collated as a single portfolio.

Although Daniel Blau specialises in historical and vintage photography, the gallery is keen to support emerging talent, say its organisers.

“Despite our focus on the past, we are very interested in and engaged with contemporary photography and have been thinking about ways in which to get involved with and support current photographic practice in the UK and beyond,” a spokesperson tells BJP. “We decided to launch the competition as we believe there is a vast wealth of young talent who deserve recognition and we hope to play a role in the development of the next generation of photographers. We hope to run this competition on an annual basis and look forward to an even larger pool of submissions next year.”

Work by each of the five photographers will be exhibited in a group show at Daniel Blau’s London gallery from 05 to 31 July.

For more visit www.danielblau.com