«The simplest photos are the most effective»
Swiss Press Photo has been spotlighting the best of Swiss press photography since 1991. Backed by the Reinhardt von Graffenried foundation in Berne, it runs a competition for Swiss Press Photographer of the Year with other awards in categories such as the Swiss press, daily life, world, people and sport.
Once the results are announced in January, there is an exhibition that travels around Switzerland showing around a hundred large-format images. They are often presented alongside the annual winners of the World Press Photo. The dual exhibition is currently at Château de Prangins, the Swiss national museum located between Geneva and Lausanne.
The 2015 Swiss Press Photographer of the Year award went to Lausanne-based Yvain Genevay. Genevay, who works for Le Matin daily newspaper, captured a Syrian family sitting on a bench in Domodossola in Italy. His photograph is a full-frontal, posed image, and appears quite ordinary at first glance. The framing is tight and he used a bit of flash to light up the shadows. The story was tragic enough as it was, says Yvain Genevay, for whom “the simplest photos are the most effective”.
The Jeneid family left Syria in 2014. He was a teacher and she was a housewife. She was expecting her fourth child. In July, the family was turned back from Switzerland to Italy. On the road back, the mother started to feel ill. With her husband, they asked the Swiss customs officers on board the vehicle for help. Their request went unheard. She lost the baby just after arriving in Domodossola.
While the photo was being taken in a park, their young son climbed up on to his mother’s knees. That left an empty space to the right of the bench, symbolising the absence of the stillborn child. Yvain Genevay would never have dared stage such a dramatic metaphor. It just happened that way when he was about to press the shutter button. It is an understated photograph going against the current trends for calculated dramatics.
Also worthy of note is the wonderful photo essay on people with electro-hypersensitivity by Geneva-based Jean Revillard in the “World” category. These people are sensitive to the electromagnetic fields caused by high-voltage lines or mobile phone aerials. Some of them take refuge in “white areas” far away from these electromagnetic fields, such as in the French Alps. To protect themselves from the invisible enemy, they set up home in caves, under wire grates or in caravans turned into Faraday cages. Unlike the main award, this series of portraits were clearly staged, yet that doesn’t make them any less effective.
EXHIBITION
Swiss Press Photo 15
Until January 31st, 2016
Château de Prangins
1197 Prangins
Switzerland
http://www.nationalmuseum.ch/f/prangins
