About
ABOUT
The FotoEvidence Association is located in France , 1 Rue du Merlan, Marseillan, 34340 (SIREN: 910871714) and the VII Foundation serves as its fiscal sponsor in the United States. US tax deductible contributions can be sent to the VII Foundation indicating that it is intended for FotoEvidence. VII Foundation, 429 W 45th St, New York, NY 10036 USA (EIN: 510427657).
Co-Presidents: Keyvan Ghavami and Darcy Padilla
Treasurer- Elitza Goudemand
Secretary: Alain Doudies
Peter Bouckaert
Aida Muluneh
Finbarr O'Reilly
David Stuart
Advisory Board: Dimitri Beck, Maral Deghati, James Whitlow Delano, Alice Driver, Tanya Habjouqa, Mike Kamber, Regina Monfort, Hadezhda Pavlova, Ramon Pez.
PARTNERS
FotoEvidence Association maintains partnerships with the Bronx Documentary Center in New York, where it mounts an annual exhibit for the Book Award winner, and with the VII Academy in Arles, who sponsor the FotoEvidence W Award.
As the association develops, we will be seeking corporate partners to help us fund future books and exhibit projects. For more information please contact info@fotoevidence.com
Above: Patrick Brown, recipient of the 2019 FotoEvidence Book Award presents his book No Place on Earth in a conversation with Mikael Owunna and Mario Cruz at the World Press Photo Festival in Amsterdam. Ten Years FotoEvidence exhibit at Aveiro Photo Fest, Portugal.
FOTOEVIDENCE PRESSFotoEvidence Press was founded in 2010 by Svetlana Bachevanova and David Stuart to continue the tradition of using photography to draw attention to human rights violations, injustice, oppression and assaults on human dignity wherever they may occur. Photographs have not only changed people’s perception but, in some cases, altered the course of history.
For ten years, the FotoEvidence Book Award recognized one photographer whose work demonstrates courage and commitment in the pursuit of social justice and, in 2017-2021, FotoEvidence partnered with World Press Photo. The book award was renamed the FotoEvidence Book Award with World Press Photo. The selected project is published by FotoEvidence as part of a series of photo books dedicated to the work of photographers, whose commitment and courage deliver truths, creating awareness and intolerance towards violations of human dignity.
In 2018 FotoEvidence launched The W Award, devoted to engaged women photographers who want to tell their stories in the form of a photo book. At this moment, women around the world are seeking equal rights and equal opportunity. The FotoEvidence W Award for Personal Story will suppot this movement. It will be granted by an international jury to one woman whose work merits a book. The hardbound book is be published by FotoEvidence. Two other photographers will receive honorable mentions.
Past recipients of the FotoEvidence Book Award include: Javier Arceniilas for “Sicarios: Latin American Assassins”, Alex Masi for “Bhopal: Second Disaster,” Robin Hammond for “Condemned: Mental Health in African Countries in Crisis”, Majid Saeedi for “Life in War", Marcus Bleasdale for "The Unravelling" ,Daniella Zalcman for "Signs of Your Identity", Josue Rivas for "Standing Strong", Patrick Brown with "No Place on Earth" and Antonio Faccilongo with "Habibi"
Past finalists for the book award include: Massimo Berruti, Valerio Bispuri, Paula Bronstein, Fabio Bucciarelli, William Daniels, Maxim Dondyuk, Michelle Frankfurter, Tanya Habjouqa , Jon Lowenstein, Fernando Moreles, Boniface Mwangi, Joao Pina, Andrea Star Reese, Vlad Sokhin, Lizzie Sadin, Lisa Wiltse, Mario Cruz, Hossein Fatemi, Ingetje Tadros, Narciso Contreras, Jan Grarup, Amnon Gutman, Alessio Romenzi ,Fabian Muir, Danielle Villasana, Zackary Canepari Fausto Podavini, Mikael Owunna, Alejandro Cegarra and Daniel Berhulak.
In addition to publishing the winner of the FotoEvidence Book Award, FotoEvidence has worked with several finalists to crowd fund the publication of a book of their work. As a result of these collaborations, FotoEvidence has published Crying Meri: Violence Against Women in Papua New Guinea by Vlad Sokhin, Urban Cave by Andrea Star Reese, Destino by Michelle Frankfurter and Occupied Pleasures by Tanya Habjouqa, Endurance by Omar Havana, This is My Country by Ingetje Tadros, The Dream by Fabio Bucciarelli, Talibes Modern Day Slaves by Mario Cruz, Gaza Girl: Growing up in the Gaza Strip by Monique Jaques.and the English ediiton of 46750 by Joao Pina.
FotoEvidence also pioneered in the publication of digital photo books. When FotoEvidence published Bronx Boys by Stephen Shames, Paul Moakley at TIME Magazine called it, “one of the first true digital photo-monographs that can be downloaded to your computer.” (Time.com, August 16, 2011). Since then FotoEvidence has published a series of digital photo books available through the iTunes bookstore.
RECOGNITION * He Threw The Last Punch Too Hard is shortlisted for the Lucie Photo Book Prize.
* He Threw The Last Punch Too Hard is selected as one of the Best photo books for 2020 by Women Photograph and Buzzfeed
- 46750 by Joao Pina selected as a finalist Lucie Photo Book Prize, winner FOLA Photobook Prize, finalist of the Prix Nadar Gens d'Image, 2018.
- A Light Inside by Danielle Villasana selected among the Best Photobooks of the Year 2018 by Women Photograph.
- The Dream by Fabio Bucciarelli is selected among the Best Photobooks of the Year 2016 by TIME magazine.
- Signs of Your Identity by Daniella Zalcman among the Most Stunning Photo Books of 2016 by Mother Jones.
- Signs of Your Identity by Daniella Zalcmanis selected as one of the Best Books of 2016 by Photo-eye.
- The Unravelling by Marcus Bleasdale was selected as one of the best books of the 2015 by Smithsonian magazine and Mother Jones magazine.
- Occupied Pleasures was selected as one of the best books of 2014 by TIME magazine.
- Destino by Michelle Frankfurter was included among the best photo books of the year by Vogue Italy and Photo-eye in 2014.
- Sicarios: Latin American Assassins by Javier Arcenillas was selected as one of the best books of the year by Photo-eye in 2012.
- Black Tsunami by James Whitlow Delano received the PX3 Bronze Prize for digital photo books in 2012.
IMPACT: Photography and Social Change
Crying Meri by Vlad Sokhin
After publication as a FotoEvidence book award finalist, Vlad Sokhin was contacted by the United Nations Commiionser of Human Rights (UNOHCHR) reqiuesting to use his photographs in a public education campaigns by the Untied Nations in Papua New Guinea (PNG). This campaign was joined by UN Women, Amnesty Internationa, ChildFund Austrailal and several othe NGOs working in Papua New Guinea. Sokhin's images were used in borchures, exhibits and even carried in demonstrations. FotoEvidence crowdfunded Sokhins book, reaching approximately 35,000 individuals. International attention and a public outcry by concerned citizens brought a response. Sokhins book release happended in the Parliament House of PNG with the Prime Minister in attendence. The parliament passed nation's first law prohibiting domestic violence that year and soon eliminated a law that forgave violence against "sorcerers."
The 2016 FotoEvidence Book Award finalist Mario Cruz has also seen his work Talibes Modern Day Slaves provoke and immediate response from the government of Senegal. Cruz gained rare access to false Quaranic schools (daaras) in Senegal where a valid educational tradition has been corrupted, leaving boys in the hands of exploitative teachers (mahouds) who forced them to beg on the street eight hours a day to support the teacher. Cruz captured powerful and disturbing photographs of the lives of young boys subjected to slave-like conditions.
We published Talibes Modern Day Slaves on our website and he received recognition from World Press Photo, who exhibited his work in their traveling exhibit. In June, shortly after “Talibes Modern Day Slaves” came off the press, the President of Senegal, Macky Sali, ordered the registration of all daaras in Senegal, and effort to distinguish legitimate schools from exploitative ones. He also order the police to identify and assist boys begging on the streets and to close the schools that sent them out to beg. The government also used Cruz’s photographs in a public education brochure alerting the public to the issue and encouraging them to report beggars and help identify illegitimate daaras.
The photographers and works published by FotoEvidence have been recognized with many other awards, including: multiple World Press Photo Awards, the W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic photography, the Visa Pour ['Image- Remi Ochlik Award, the Robert R Kennedy Photojournalism Award, Picture of the Year International, the National Press Photographers Association Award, World Understanding Award, and the Magnum Foundation Emergency Fund grant.
A Light Inside by Danielle Villasana inspired the medical community in Lima, Peru to create a consultation center dedicated to the treatment of trans women.
SVETLANA BACHEVANOVA
Co-founder and executive Director
Svetlana Bachevanova is the executive director of the FotoEvidence Association. She is a Bulgarian American photojournalist and a co-founder FotoEvidence (2010). The books she and her team publish expose injustice, create enduring evidence of violations of human rights and inspire social change.
Svetlana has worked with some of the most skilled and dedicated documentary photographers to publish their work, human stories recounting indisputable evidence of social injustice. In addition to managing the publication of books, FotoEvidence exhibits she curated have been mounted around the world to promote justice.
Svetlana conceived the FotoEvidence Book Award and the FotoEvidence W Award to support the work of photographers dedicated to the pursuit of human rights, publishing work that is unlikely to find commercial publication. Under her management FotoEvidence has occupied a unique space in the world of photojournalism as both a publishing house and activist organization.
Her career as a publisher has supported creative ideas and technology innovations, including the production of the “first true digital photo monograph” Bronx Boys by Stephen Shames, as mentioned in TIME magazine. (2011)
Svetlana's life as a photojournalist and human rights activist started underground at the first anticommunist newspaper in Bulgaria (1988). Today she is leading an organizations that supports photographers like her and her former colleagues, who bring light to dark places and move people to action.
DAVID STUART
Co-founder And Executive Editor
David Stuart is a sociologist with a dedication to human rights that began as a teenager at the United Nations International School in New York. In a previous incarnation, he was a founder of the Freelance Players (now Rehearsal for Life) an educational theater organization in Boston. As the Executive Director of the Disarmament Action Network, he spent six years working with over 100 organizations to mobilize opposition to US military and foreign policy. He spent eight years with the Boston College Media Research and Action Project, designing and analyzing research on the mass media and political discourse and consulting to social movement groups. During this period he helped initiate United for a Fair Economy, an organization focused on income inequality. He has managed political campaigns and worked as a consultant to business, social movement and non-profit organizations.
NABEEL MUSHTAQ
Backend Engineer
Compiled built, and deployed in Islamabad, Nabeel has been field tested for over half a decade now with state of the art tools and technologies. His once lowly performance enjoyed rapid upgrades at National University, where he extended on his base OS to understand Software Engineering in particular and Computer Science in general. After beta testing in startup market, Nabeel found his way as technology consultant for over a year now where he plays active role in establishing enterprise applications. Now a days you would find him orchestrating development activities.
CONTACT
For questions about FotoEvidence: