Extraordinary Moments in Ordinary Places: AAP Street Winners Announced

All About Photo has announced the winners of AAP Magazine #52: Street, featuring 25 photographers from 15 countries across five continents. First place went to Savadmon Avalachamveettil (Ireland) for the series MahaKumbh – World’s Largest Gathering, with Jozef Macak (Slovakia) and David Masoko (The Netherlands) taking second and third places.

The winning images capture life in cities and towns around the world, highlighting the diversity, sensitivity, and intuition of each photographer’s vision, and will be featured in the printed issue and All About Photo Winners Gallery. Here are the winning images:

Winners AAP Magazine 52 Street

1st Place Winner: Savadmon Avalachamveettil (Ireland)
Title of the image: One Among Millions
Title of the series: MahaKumbh – World’s Largest Gathering

A once-in-144 years phenomenon. Ash-smeared Hindu holy men (Naga Sadhus) charged into India’s most sacred river Ganges at dawn on the first most significant bathing day of the Kumbh Mela festival. An extraordinary display of human unity, spiritual energy, and collective consciousness.

2nd Place Winner: Jozef Macak (Slovakia)
Title of the image:  River taxi

Title of the series: Tides of life

This series traces the uneasy intimacy between people and water. A relationship marked by necessity, resilience, and quiet harm. Across Bangladesh, rivers reflect this same tension: lifelines turned fragile, ecosystems pushed to the edge. This series offers a glimpse into that reality where water nourishes and betrays, and where its spirit persists against the slow ache of environmental neglect.

3rd place winner David Masoko (Netherlands)
Title of the image: Dislocated Presences, Diptych 8
Title of the series: Dislocated Presences

Dislocated Presences is an ongoing series of urban diptychs that lingers in the unnoticed moments of city life. By pairing candid street scenes, the work reflects on anonymity, displacement, and the quiet choreography of human presence. Each image resists narrative resolution, instead offering a trace — a fragment suspended in time. Through a muted palette, softened edges, and gestures caught mid-motion, the series invites the viewer to slow down, to witness rather than consume, and to contemplate the fragile tension between visibility and disappearance.

MERIT AWARD GALLERY

Francesco Fantini (Italy)
Title: Stamford Hill, 2024.
Series: London

A group of Orthodox Jewish boys in their neighbourhood of Stamford Hill, North London, on the eve of the Passover holiday. They are burning chametz, leavened food forbidden during Passover, as a symbolic and literal purging of leaven before the holiday begins.

Danielle Goldstein (USA)
Image: Jump for Joy
Series: Minimal City

When we walk around densely populated areas of the world its easy to see only their sheer vastness: the architecture, the infrastructure, the commerce, the sensory onslaught and the incessant supply of humanity, that staggering, impenetrable vastness is what makes these areas of the world both endlessly fascinating and incredibly infuriating, and it’s easy to get wrapped up in the blunt, visceral emotion that the hugeness of these cities evokes in us. It’s easy to forget that the dense forest is, in reality, a collection of trees—all of them breathing, growing, living, and dying, one beside the other beside the other.

Every one of us has a story, a life, and all the joys, hardships, pain and happiness that go along with that life. So, with my camera, I strive to pay attention to the individuals who breathe, grow, and live side by side in the modern world. Through my photography, I want to cast their jetsam in beauty, their silhouettes in reverence, their anonymity in recognition, their hustle in stillness. Bringing awareness to the city’s small and elegant moments is, for me, an act of love, devotion and hopefully compassion. While it is so easy to get caught up in life’s drama and difficulties, it is important to remember that we are all in this together.

Pekka Välitalo (Finland)
Don´t know where to go from here 

I like to shoot everyday life in the streets, focusing on urban landscapes with the interplay of light and shadow. I try to create an emotional narrative that feels introspective, poetic and brings a sense of quiet contemplation.

Bartosz Michalik (Poland)
Image: Mirror

National Gallery, London, 2024. A visitor in an open-back dress sketches before “Susanna at her Bath.” Her posture echoes the model’s turned back and backward glance, creating a quiet dialogue across centuries between observer and image.

France Leclerc (United States)
Title of the Image: Balloon Vendor
Title of the Series: Riding the Pilgrims’ Rails

In Dhaka, overcrowded trains are a crucial part of daily life.  But once a year, during the Bishwa Ijtema—the world’s second-largest Muslim gathering—the crowds grow beyond what seems possible. Pilgrims pour into Tongi from all parts of Bangladesh, drawn by three days of prayer and sermons by Islamic scholars. Special trains are added, but demand far exceeds supply, and so travellers climb wherever they can.  Amid the frenzy, there are rare pockets of calm: a train car with only a handful of passengers, a balloon vendor chasing potential customers, almost otherworldly against the backdrop of the mass pilgrimage, moments where time seems to pause before the next surge of humanity.

Gail Just (USA)
Title: Venice Beach, February 2023
Series Title: Short Takes

On a late February afternoon, Venice Beach (Ca) was hosting an “underwear” running event. Despite the flamboyance and energy of the runners, it was the bystanders that caught my camera’s eye.

Derry Ainsworth  (United Kingdom)
Image: Chasing Colours
Year: 2024
Location: Choi Hung Estate, Hong Kong
Series: HIGHS & LOWS

From my new Hong Kong book ‘HIGHS & LOWS’ showcasing Hong Kong from unique perspectives – a mix of aerial cityscapes and intimate scenes of everyday life in the streets.

Alon Goldsmith (USA/South Africa)
Image Title: Surveillance
Series Title: Not applicable

Captured on the Venice Beach Boardwalk at the height of the COVID-19 shutdown, Surveillance reflects a moment of quiet tension and unexpected connection. Against a wall freshly painted over in what I call “COVID Brown,” a man and his dog glide by on a skateboard—the man masked, the dog locking eyes with the camera. The image embodies one aspect of my approach to street photography: finding a stage and waiting for life to unfold. Only later did I learn that the subject was unhoused. I found a way to send him a print, and he was thrilled to receive. For me, that exchange completed the story.

Giedo van der Zwan (Netherlands)
Title of the image: ‘Colors’

This picture I too during a workshop with ShootLike a Local that I was conducting in Madrid. It was evening in May, and I was walking to a meeting point where I would meet the group after an assignment when I passed this scene. I saw the light on the wall, the bags in the window, the letters on the wall and the shadows of two men playing around… Four layers that I saw could work together very well!. I stayed with the scene until the shadows were perfectly placed on the wall, and took many shots until I was happy, before I rushed off to meet the others.

Pelin Guven (Turkey)
Title of the selected photo: City Barbie
Title of the series: What New York Gives

I’m a Turkish photographer now calling Switzerland home. Photography is how I live and how I see. When I walk into the street with my camera, I feel at home. I wander without a plan, following light, then a gesture, a flash of color, a fleeting glance. I move as if dancing, led by instinct and the rhythm of the street. In those moments, I’m completely present, alive, and free.

New York is the great daylight stage, alive with sirens and steam, cab yellows and reflections, the quick rhythm of movement, grit and light. In this series, I let light do the talking. Pink glows where shadow softens, color interrupts routine, and people drift through the frame like passing thoughts. I don’t chase stories; I let them come to me. Each photograph is both discovery and surrender to what the city gives.

Denise Pensky USA
“Flying High.
“𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘥𝘰𝘶𝘣𝘵 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘧𝘭𝘺, 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘤𝘦𝘢𝘴𝘦 𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘣𝘦𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘥𝘰 𝘪𝘵.” ~ 𝘑.𝘔. 𝘉𝘢𝘳𝘳𝘪𝘦, 𝘗𝘦𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘗𝘢𝘯

While at a Santeria dance demonstration, I initially focused on the costumed dancers, and then I turned around and saw these young boys leaping on and off a bench. They were having such a good time together – not a care in the world, confident, literally jumping for joy. This was such a happy moment, and I remember hoping that they would never lose their spirit.

Jay Calderon (USA)
Title: “Downward Dog”
Title of the series:  “Ellipses”

These are attempts at expressions of the indecisive moment, the momentary pause that comprises individual experience.   My hope is, like the ellipses, they hint at something “more” or that something has been left unsaid. 

Eric Davidove (USA)
Title of the image: Skiing
Title of the series: Slow Ride

Short text explaining the image or project: The Slow Ride series is about the art of going nowhere in style. From toy lowrider classics to theme-based convertibles, these tiny vehicles, and their even tinier drivers, prove that it’s not about the destination, it’s about the vibe.

Jaejoon Ha (South Korea)
Image: Reading the newspaper
Title of the series: Reading the newspaper in Washington Square Park –

I’ll never forget my walks in New York this summer! I spend both sorrow and joy in Washington Square Park.

Chris van Dolleweerd (Netherlands)
Title: Cova
Title serie:Incognito

This image is part of my ongoing Incognito series. In a world where everyone seems to be constantly visible, there is a fascinating beauty to be found in the unnoticed, the inconspicuous, the anonymous. This series is a visual journey through moments of silent anonymity, in which the everyday person, unrecognisable and undirected, is captured in its purest form.

The origins of this project lie in a time of isolation and distance, during the coronavirus pandemic. When our faces were covered and we often felt invisible, a sense of anonymity grew in many — and sometimes even of deep loneliness. This work is an attempt to capture and preserve that feeling: the anonymity of a crowd, the silent sadness of a soul-alone person on the street, and the hidden stories in every face that never really become visible.

Shay Lari-Hosain (USA)
Title of Image: Silence in B-Flat I #4
Title of Series: Silence in B-Flat I

Silence in B-Flat critiques the individualistic surveillance-centric natures of the built environment, investigates localized histories through dreamlike layering and sequencing, and plays with time by blurring the boundaries of verisimilitude in a photograph.

In Silence in B-Flat I, by making hundreds of exposures and selectively averaging frames of my choosing, I assume editorial control—toggling the positions of stoplights, illuminated windows, cars, and pedestrians. Some scenes may resemble a single frame, while others are effectively “staged” from events that transpired over hours. The resulting scenes reconstruct time nonlinearly, creating new narratives.

This process creates a surreal rendering of the scene that appears simultaneously authentic and unreal (almost painterly, as the process removes nearly all photographic noise, heightening the radiance of color gradients through no other manipulation), raising instinctive questions in the viewer about the veracity of the scene. This ambiguity impacts the trust the viewer may place in the images as a photographic record.

Igor Gladkov (Russia)
Image: Sergey to smoke a pipe
The title of the series is At the bottom of St. Petersburg wells 

Sergey loves to smoke a pipe. He looks like he came out of a Van Gogh painting. In St. Petersburg, residential buildings built in Tsarist Russia resemble wells. There are abandoned houses, and homeless people live here.  At the very bottom of St. Petersburg wells. These people have their own history, biographies.

Asako Naruto (Japan)
Title of the selected image: Night Blues 
Title of the series:  Nocturnal Monologues

Night descends upon Madrid. A faint tremor runs through the silence, where unspoken words seem to linger. I listen to those quiet murmurs and imagine the stories that were never told. I consider myself a street photographer, yet I am drawn less to the decisive moment than to scenes where time appears to pause—moments of introspection suspended in stillness. I am particularly fond of photographing at night, perhaps because the darkness allows me to disappear and become the narrator myself. Using highlight-weighted metering to capture fragments illuminated by artificial light, I collect these moments as if recording someone’s monologue. Together, they form this body of work—an intimate record of nocturnal Madrid.

Gabriel Marcos (Venezuela)
Title of the image: Beyond the Glass
Title of the series: Dislocated

“This series is the result of wandering the city while exploring my own inner streets. I never set out to define a place or a theme; I simply observed and collected fragments that resonated with something already within me. Through faces, reflections, and silhouettes, a sense of fragmentation and estrangement took form—feelings long present, now given shape. But far from offering answers, these images opened new questions. These images are those questions.”

Justin Roque (France)
By the empty pool
Series: Fragment 01

I had gone to the northwest of France for a few days to take photos in the port of Le Havre, the largest port in France. During this stay I wanted to go for a walk in Deauville a little further south to change the atmosphere. I had very little time there, so I decided to go directly to the Deauville boards by the sea. There, I didn’t see much to photograph, Deauville is very famous with these boards and its colorful parasols by the sea. There was nothing original to photograph. Then, I saw a small recess on the left, I ventured there out of curiosity, and there, I discovered an area where vacationers have their changing cabins with a sort of very shallow and empty « pool » in the middle. I already liked the atmosphere and the light.

Then I saw at the very end of the pool, two people reading quietly. The photo was there, they were perfect in this environment, a little cut off from the world compared to the large number of tourists who were walking the boards right next to them. The framing was imposed quickly, and I had to act quickly because I didn’t want them to spot me. The light was very beautiful too; there was a very cinematographic side to the whole thing, which is good for a city like Deauville, which hosts the American film festival every year.

FABRIZIO INTONTI (Italy)
TITLE: “AWAY”
SERIES: “THE OTHERS»

In the era of pervasive communication, of continuous and hyperactive interaction with our peers, a question arises again: who are others, truly? “Hell is other people,” Sartre replied, meaning that the gaze of others objectifies us, fixes and crystallizes us into a representation.

And how much can the external representation we give of ourselves at a given moment, our way of appearing, here and now, truly tell about us? What can photography, in this sense, show of the “others,” of their interiority?

I start from this insurmountable dichotomy of internal and external, of subjectivity and objectivity when I take photographs of perfect strangers, alone or in groups, near or far, as if for a moment it were possible to overcome the very limit of representation and create a form of connection.

Nicola Balestrazzi (Italy)
Title of the Image: Puebla
Title of the Series: Mexico’s Crosses

Catholic tradition and symbolism are still very strong in Mexico. From North to South, being either religious events and festivals such as the Passion of Christ and the Day of the Dead or being simply a square, a street, or the numerous churches all around, the cross is the most omnipresent symbol in Mexico. This street photography project showcases all the crosses I have come across in all the different surroundings I found myself in, on the many occasions I have visited the country.

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