16th Visa pour l’Image – Perpignan

The 16th edition of the international festival of photojournalism, Visa pour l’image, will offer from Saturday, August 28th in Perpignan a rich program, with about thirty exhibitions, numerous prizes and a symposium.
This year, Visa will close its doors to the general public on September 12th. The professional week, where photographers are flocking, will take place from August 30 to September 5.
In 2003, some thirty free exhibitions distributed throughout the Catalan city attracted 174,000 visitors, 270 photo agencies, 3,000 accredited, from 49 countries, especially from Eastern Europe.
Since the creation of Visa in 1989, the Festival has welcomed 1.649 million visitors.
Among the thirty or so exhibitions are some great names such as Henri Bureau, Abbas and Willy Ronis, 94 years old, in a retrospective ranging from the Popular Front to his most recent photos.
Visa will once again reflect a world in convulsions: Iraq, Rwanda, East Africa, the mentally ill in Asia (John Stanmeyer, VII), young disabled Canadians and Bengali (Michel Szulc-Krzyzanowski, Cover), drug addicts in Ruili, China (Lu Guang, Gamma) etc..
The evenings that will take place during the professional week, on a big open-air screen at Campo Santo, will retrace the highlights of the past year. Iraq, the situation in Israel and Palestine, Haiti, the centenary of the birth of Dali, the 50th anniversary of the appeal of Abbé Pierre, the 10th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide and the Liberation of Paris will be evoked. Nearly 10,000 photos were projected in 2003.
More than 70 agencies and collectives will also present their work.

THE EXHIBITIONS
Abbas – The Shi’ite alarm clock
AP Jerusalem – Associated Press Retrospective: The Second Intifada
Karim Ben Khelifa – One year after the fall of the Rais
Henri Bureau – Retrospective
Olivier Coret – Israel / Palestine: at the foot of the wall
Jason Eskenazi – Wonderland
Stefan Falke – School of Art and Culture The Dragon Keylemanjahro
Lu Guang – Drug addicts in Ruili, Yunnan Province
Benoît Gysembergh – Rwanda
Charles Harbutt – Retrospective
Guillaume Herbaut – Shkodra
Tim Hetherington – No conditions are permanent. Liberia, May 2003 / May 2004
Ken Light – Coal Hollow
Marco Longari – East Africa
Bertrand Meunier – Karachi: city of death
Christopher Morris – The New Republic: One Nation under God
Jack Picone – Thailand / Burma border
Noël Quidu – In the Heart of Darkness
Reuters Agency – One Shot
Nicolas Reynard – The hidden tribes of the Amazon
Eugene Richards – The fat baby
Willy Ronis – Retrospective
Edith Roux – Dreamscape
John Stanmeyer – Lost Lives. The Mental Health Crisis in Asia
David Strick – Hollywood
Michel Szulc-Krzyzanowski – Little Heroines
Geert Van Kesteren – Why, Sir, why?
Ami Vitale – Kashmir
International Daily Press
World Press Photo

THE WINNERS
Visa d’or News Award: Olivier Jobard
Visa d’or Feature Award: Stéphanie Sinclair
Visa d’or Daily Press Award: El Comercio (Peru)

Canon Female Photojournalist Award: Kristen Ashburn