The award ceremony will take place on 6 June 2024 as part of the opening of the exhibition (duration 07.06. – 15.09.2024). The BMW Group and the MdbK will present the BMW Photo Award Leipzig for the first time in 2024. The first winners are Margit Emmrich, Susanne Keichel and Stephan Takkides.
Image above: MdbK_BMW Award_Jurysitzung
In future, the BMW Photo Award Leipzig will be presented every two years to artists who either have a biographical connection to Leipzig and the region or who consciously engage with the city and its surroundings in their artistic work. The prerequisite is work in the medium of photography or related visual media. The three prizewinners are selected by a changing, international jury of nominees consisting of artists, curators, art school professors and other experts. Each jury member proposes three positions. The prize is endowed with €5,000 per artist and is linked to a joint exhibition including a catalogue at the MdbK.
BMW and the MdbK have several aims in awarding the prize. Firstly, it is about generally strengthening Leipzig as a centre for photography and the photographers working here. In particular, young positions and those that, in the jury’s view, have not yet been adequately recognised publicly are to be highlighted. In addition, the prize is an expression of the high value placed on photography at the MdbK and the trusting collaboration between the museum and BMW in this field that has lasted for over 20 years. And finally, the exhibition of the prize-winning works is intended to make an artistic contribution to society’s self-assurance about the city’s past and present and possible perspectives for its future.
THE JURY
The jury for the first BMW Photo Award Leipzig met at the MdbK at the beginning of December. Its members were Ines Schaber/professor of photography and media, Academy of Visual Arts Leipzig, Inka Schube/curator of photography, Sprengel Museum Hanover, Andrzej Steinbach/photographer, media and object artist, Berlin, Christoph Wiesner/director of the Rencontres de la Photographie d’Arles and Philipp Freytag/curator of photography and media art at the MdbK. The three winners were chosen by the jury with a unanimous vote.
THE CO-OPERATION
The BMW Group and the MdbK have enjoyed a successful partnership for 18 years. The foundation stone was laid in 2005 with the donation of the comprehensive AutoWerke:
European and American Photography with over 70 works – including works by Thomas Demand, Thomas Struth, Rineke Dijkstra and Candida Höfer – on the occasion of the opening of the new museum building and the commissioning of the BMW production facility in Leipzig. Since then, the BMW Leipzig branch and the BMW Group have regularly supported the museum with acquisitions and exhibitions. In 2023, the two partners have now agreed on an in-depth collaboration (initially) for five years with the aim of BMW supporting and promoting the MdbK’s initiatives for contemporary photography. In addition to the award, this includes the promotion of exhibitions – such as the current Evelyn Richter. A Photographer’s Life – and acquisitions.
THE 2024 AWARD WINNERS
Margit Emmrich: Born in Chemnitz in 1949, grew up in Leipzig | 1969-1974 studied photography at the HGB under Heinz Föppel and Joachim Jansong | 1976-1978 studied at the HGB | 1974-1979 worked as a freelancer in Leipzig and Berlin | 1979-1980 political imprisonment | 1981-1987 employed in Freiburg/Breisgau | 1987-1994 family work in Erlangen | 1994 returned to Leipzig and has worked there as a freelancer ever since. “Margit Emmrich’s work has a considerable significance for the visual memory of the city of Leipzig as well as East Germany and united Germany as a whole. This applies to the social conditions and developmental psychology she documents as well as to her photographic approach. Her humanistic social documentary photography combines high artistic standards with concrete sociological questions. This makes her exemplary for the tradition of Leipzig photography in the last third of the 20th century.” (Philipp Freytag)
Susanne Keichel: Born 1981 in Dresden | 2000-2003 training as a photographer with Stefan Thurmann in Hamburg | 2003-2005 freelance photo assistant in Hamburg | 2006/2007 guest student in Jitka Hanzlová’s seminar at the HFBK Hamburg | 2013 diploma in photography at the HGB | 2016 master student graduate with Tina Bara. Susanne Keichel lives and works in Dresden. “In her work, Susanne Keichel deals with questions of racism, classism and social justice. In doing so, she creates pictorial spaces that question stereotypes and test visualisation.” (Ines Schaber)
Stephan Takkides: Born 1981 in Canterbury | 1999-2000 Foundation Studies, Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts, London | 2002 Universität der Künste Berlin | 2000-2003 BA, Chelsea College of Arts, University of the Arts, London | 2010-2012 MFA, Transart Institute, University of Plymouth, USA/UK | 2018-2021 Master student at the HGB with Joachim Brohm. Stephan Takkides lives and works in Leipzig. “Stephan Takkides is a British-Cypriot photographer and artist naturalised in Germany. In his multi-channel video work Naturalisation, he explores the relationship between nature and national identity, interweaving different perspectives and narratives.” (Ines Schaber)
WHEN?
Thuesday, 6. June 2024
WHERE?
Museum der bildenden Künste Leipzig
Katharinenstraße 10
04109 Leipzig
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