Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2027 shortlist revealed: Hoda Afshar, Lotus L. Kang, Sasha Kurmaz and Salvatore Vitale

The four artists shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2027 are today revealed as Hoda Afshar, Lotus L. Kang, Sasha Kurmaz and Salvatore Vitale.

The Prize identifies and rewards artists for an exhibition or book that has made a significant contribution to photography in Europe within the past 12 months. Over its long history, the Prize is renowned for spotlighting outstanding and innovative work and celebrating the work of leading international photographers. 2027 marks the 30th anniversary of the first prize giving.

The 2027 shortlisted projects feature photography, film and sound, sculptural installations, archival photographs and materials, and handmade collage. The compelling shortlist examines how images shape our understanding of bodies, war, labour and power. Together the shortlisted artists investigate desire and memory; the human costs of the digital economy; surviving in times of conflict; and the politics in the act of looking. The exhibition of selected works from the four artists’ shortlisted projects will be at The Photographers’ Gallery, London, from 10 March to 6 June 2027. It will then be on display at the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation in Eschborn/Frankfurt from 19 June to 26 September 2027.

The winner of the £30,000 prize will be announced on Thursday, 29 April 2027, with each of the other shortlisted artists receiving £5,000. Details of the exhibition and award ceremony will be announced in early 2027.

The 2027 shortlisted artists and projects are:

Hoda Afshar (b.1983, Tehran, Iran) is shortlisted for the exhibition “Performing the Invisible” at the Musée du Quai Branly – Jacques Chirac, Paris, France (30 September 2025 – 25 January 2026).

Through a combination of photographs, drawings, mirrors, videos and sound installations, Afshar explores the history of established perspectives and photography as a tool of revelation and resistance.
“The Fold”, at the centre of the exhibition, is a sustained investigation into the enduring legacy of colonial photographic practice, and the ways in which it continues to shape how bodies, particularly veiled Islamic bodies, are seen and consumed. Working with the archive of French psychiatrist and photographer Gaëtan Gatian de Clérambault (1872–1934), Afshar encountered thousands of photographs he made in Morocco. Through photographing veiled women, and occasionally men, de Clérambault explored his psychoanalytic ideas around covering and fantasy. Using the recurring motif of the mirror, Afshar disrupts this historical archive and shifts the usual focus to turn things around, making the viewer, or the act of looking itself, the object of investigation and knowledge. She questions the violence of the gaze and exposes deeper issues concerning the nature of vision and control.

Lotus L. Kang (b.1985, Toronto, Canada) is shortlisted for the exhibition “The face of desire is loss” at the Bulgari Pavilion, 61st Venice Biennale, Italy (9 May – 22 November 2026).

Combining photography, film and sculpture, this immersive installation looks at how bodies change over time, what we remember and what gets lost along the way. The exhibition’s title is drawn from “Thresholes” (2020), a poetry collection by American writer Lara Mimosa Montes. Echoing Montes’ writing, Kang’s installation lives in the space in between, where time and the body are fluid and constantly changing. Lengths of unfixed photographic film, which Kang calls “skins”, are suspended from steel joists. They respond to light and humidity, developing bruises, blood and bile-like hues over time. Sculptures of tatami mats and cast objects in plaster, bronze and fibreglass of crying birds and kelp knots evoke the body in states of rest, dream, recovery and death. 49 bottles of spirits reflect the days a soul spends between death and rebirth in Buddhist belief, alongside a film of tidal mudflats and visualisations of birdsong. Together they symbolise the constant flux of life and death.

Sasha Kurmaz (b.1986, Kyiv, Ukraine) is shortlisted for the publication “Red Horse”, published by Éditions Images Vevey in November 2025.

Kurmaz began the project following the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. This diaristic journey into war tells the deeply personal story of his life, alongside the lives of those around him who are struggling to survive in constant danger. The 800-page visual diary brings together handmade collages in a first-hand account of life in Ukraine perpetually reshaped by the destructive force of war. Kurmaz combines documentary photographs, notes, drawings, newspaper cuttings and found objects to capture both his own experiences and those of the people around him. Alongside his thoughts, fears and pain, the accumulation of these fragile collages questions how prolonged states of emergency and ongoing war affect individuals, society, democratic systems and public spaces. “Red Horse” is an urgent reflection on how war reshapes lives and our collective memory, while asking what it means to make art in times of conflict.

Salvatore Vitale (b.1986, Palermo, Italy) is shortlisted for the exhibition “SABOTAGE” at Photo Elysée, Lausanne, Switzerland (6 March – 31 May 2026).

In “SABOTAGE”, Vitale explores the hidden human labour sustaining the digital economy, questioning the systems of automation, surveillance and algorithmic control that increasingly shape contemporary working conditions. The exhibition exposes a central contradiction of technological progress: behind the promise of automation lies a vast workforce whose labour is largely invisible, precarious and subject to continuous monitoring. Developed through collaborations with South African freelancers, “SABOTAGE” investigates how contemporary digital infrastructures reproduce historical and colonial patterns of extraction, exploitation and inequality. Through the notion of sabotage, Vitale explores possibilities of resistance, refusal and agency within systems designed to regulate and control human labour. Bringing together film, photography and sculptural installations, “SABOTAGE” connects the invisible processes of digital labour to their material consequences, revealing a system driven by productivity, exhaustion and obsolescence.
 

The 2027 jury and statements:

The jury are: Laia Abril (multidisciplinary artist), Damarice Amao (Associate Curator for Photography at the Musée National d’Art Moderne / Centre Pompidou), Verónica Fieiras (artist, editor and publisher at CHACO), Anne-Marie Beckmann (Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation) and Shoair Mavlian (The Photographers’ Gallery), as voting chair.

Shoair Mavlian, Director of The Photographers’ Gallery, said:

“As we reach the 30th anniversary of the prize giving, the 2027 Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize shortlist represents the expansiveness of photography and how it’s used to explore ideas of resistance, conflict, memory and identity in our contemporary age. We look forward to sharing the work of the shortlisted artists at The Photographers' Gallery in London in 2027.”

Anne-Marie Beckmann, Director of the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation, said:

“From century-old photographic archives to radical contemporary experiments, the 2027 shortlist proves how urgently photography speaks to our times. The nominated projects are both rigorous and profoundly moving. Congratulations to the four artists whose compelling projects push the boundaries of photography.”

Notes to Editors:

You can find an overview of the press images for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2027 shortlist here. We will be happy to send you the press images in print quality upon request.

Media Contacts:

Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation

Anika Manthey
media.foundation@deutsche-boerse.com

The Photographers’ Gallery

Robyn Deane
robyn@margaretlondon.com

Alex Finch
alex@margaretlondon.com

About the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation

The Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation is a non-profit organisation based in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, dedicated to collecting, exhibiting and promoting contemporary photography. It is responsible for the development and presentation of the Art Collection Deutsche Börse, which now comprises over 2,400 photographic works by around 180 artists from 40 countries. In its exhibition space in Eschborn near Frankfurt am Main, the Foundation presents several public exhibitions each year. It supports young artists through awards, scholarships or the talent programme of the Fotografiemuseum Amsterdam Foam. Together with the Photographers' Gallery in London, it awards the renowned Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize every year. The Foundation also supports exhibition projects by international museums and institutions and fosters academic dialogue on photography as well as curatorial practice.
www.deutscheboersephotographyfoundation.org

About the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize history

Founded in 1996 by The Photographers’ Gallery, the Prize is one of the most prestigious international arts awards and has launched and established the careers of many photographers over the years. Previously known as the Citigroup Photography Prize, the Gallery has been in collaboration with Deutsche Börse Group since 2005. In 2016 the Prize was retitled the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize, following the establishment of the Foundation as a non-profit organisation, dedicated to collecting, exhibiting and promoting contemporary photography. The winner of the 2026 Prize was Rene Matić for their exhibition “AS OPPOSED TO THE TRUTH” at CCA Berlin, Germany in 2024/25. Past winners include: Lindokuhle Sobekwa, Lebohang Kganye, Samuel Fosso, Deana Lawson, Cao Fei, Mohamed Bourouissa, Susan Meiselas, Luke Willis Thompson, Dana Lixenberg, Trevor Paglen, Juergen Teller, Rineke Dijkstra, and Adam Broomberg & Oliver Chanarin.

The Photographers’ Gallery

The Photographers’ Gallery explores how photography is connecting, captivating and radically changing our world today. The Gallery’s programme and spaces – from exhibitions, talks, workshops and digital platforms, to the galleries, shop and cafe – all explore the beauty, complexity and future of photography. Right outside the Gallery, the very best of contemporary photography is shown for free, day and night, in Soho Photography Quarter.
www.tpg.org.uk