GOTHENBURG.- The Hasselblad Foundation International Award in Photography for 2008 has been granted to Graciela Iturbide from Mexico City.

Graciela Iturbide is considered one of the most important and influential Latin American photographers of the past four decades. Her photography is of the highest visual strength and beauty. Graciela Iturbide has developed a photographic style based on her strong interest in culture, ritual, and everyday life in her native Mexico and other countries. Iturbide has extended the concept of documentary photography, to explore the relationships between man and nature, the individual and the cultural, the real and the psychological. She continues to inspire a younger generation of photographers in Latin America and beyond.

This year’s prize committee, which submitted its proposal to the Foundation’s Board of Directors, comprised:

Frits Gierstberg, (Chair) Head of Exhibitions, Nederlands Fotomuseum, Rotterdam, The Netherlands,
David Chandler, Director, Photoworks, Brighton, England,
Monika Faber, Chief Curator, Albertina Collection of Photographs, Austria,
Michiko Kasahara, Chief Curator, Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Tokyo, Japan,
Patricia Mendoza, Director, Instituto de Artes Gráficas de Oaxaca, Mexico.

The Hasselblad Award is an international photography prize, awarded for the first time in 1980. It has been presented annually since then, with the exception of the year of Erna Hasselblad’s death 1983.

The Hasselblad Award is granted to “a photographer recognized for major achievements”. This may be an individual who has made a pioneering achievement in photography, who has had a decisive impact on one or more younger generations of photographers, or who has implemented one or more internationally significant photographic projects. Today the award comprises the sum of SEK 500,000, a gold medal and a diploma. In conjunction with the award ceremony, an exhibition of the work of the award winner opens at the Hasselblad Center.

Each year, the Board of Directors of the Foundation appoints an award committee of nationally and internationally prominent experts in photography. The committee nominates three candidates, after which the final decision regarding the award winner is made by the Board of Directors of the Hasselblad Foundation.

The Hasselblad award is the most important prize in photography in the world today, and the award ceremony has become an international event of unique prestige, with award winners of great international renown.

The name of the award winner is announced each year on or around 8 March, the birthday of Victor Hasselblad. The award is then presented in October or November at a formal ceremony in Göteborg. On the same day, an exhibition of the work of the award winner opens at the Hasselblad Center exhibition wing of the Göteborg Art Museum.