3 new photographic series to change the way we look at precarity in France: the jury, chaired by Valérie Jouve and composed of recognized professionals from the worlds of photography and the fight against poverty, has chosen the three 2026 winners:
The 2026 Grand Prix Photo Sociale is awarded to François Le Guen for his series “La longue saison.” His work explores the daily lives of vulnerable people in an isolated hamlet in Provence that is home to a community offering refuge to fragile and marginalized life paths. For people in recovery, homeless, undocumented, socially disconnected or experiencing long-term itinerancy, the welcome there is unconditional and without time limit. An echo chamber of our society, its ills and its dead ends
The Special Jury Prize goes to Naïma Lecomte for her series “Faucon,” which documents the lives of seven teenagers entrusted to the child welfare system at an educational farm, Bergerie de Faucon.
The Nouveau Regard Prize for social photography is awarded to Valérie Horwitz for her series “In between.” Her project with and about young female minors in two prisons in France attempts to create spaces of expression and freedom; physical and psychological spaces of resistance.
The Grand Prize winner receives a grant of €3,000 and will see his series published as a monograph by Éditions Filigranes in September. The other two winners each receive a grant of €1,000.
The series by the three winners will be presented in two exhibitions:
– From September 11 to October 5 at Château d’Eau in Toulouse (opening on September 10)
– From late November 2026 to early 2027 at the Town Hall of the 10th Arrondissement in Paris.
With this new edition, the Prix Photo Sociale reinforces its commitment to highlighting photographers who strive to show the realities of poverty, precarity, and exclusion in France. This prize aims to encourage new perspectives and original approaches to social photography, thus providing a platform for artists whose work raises public awareness of these major issues.
