The Hasselblad Foundation announced that Sophie Ristelhueber is the 2025 Hasselblad Award laureate, the world’s largest photography award, consisting of SEK 2,000,000, a gold medal, and a Hasselblad camera.
The laureate is honoured with a solo exhibition at the Hasselblad Center in Gothenburg from 11 October 2025 until 18 January 2026
Lebanon, Kuwait, the former Yugoslavia, Iraq, and the West Bank – places marked by conflict often make up the core of Sophie Ristelhueber’s work. Avoiding the sensational, she instead captures an emotional intensity in the silent, enduring traces of human presence and activity. A recurring theme in her artistic practice is humanity’s perpetual cycle of creation and destruction, followed by renewal. The photographs in her series are meticulously selected fragments of a larger narrative, where the viewer is invited to create the story.
Sophie Ristelhueber: “As you know, one does not die from being unloved, but from not being believed, an old friend of mine used to say when we were talking about the artist’s condition. What is at stake is that we put every- thing on the line, inventing new patterns without knowing if they will ever resonate. And this is why, for me as an artist, this prestigious award holds such a deep significance.”
Hasselblad Foundation
Ekmansgatan 8
SE-412 56 Gothenburg, Sweden
www.hasselbladfoundation.se
