Africa Geographic has just disqualified Björn Persson, its 2019 Photographer of the Year. His photo of an elephant named Tim won this year’s contest. However, the judges later discovered that the image doesn’t accurately reflect Tim’s look. It turned out that Persson overdid it with photo manipulation, so he’s been stripped of his award and a new contest winner has been announced.
Mayor Claims City’s Image Was Distorted; Requests World Press Photo To Withdraw Prize
Just two weeks after World Press Photo’s announcement that 22% of entries that had reached the penultimate round were disqualified due to excessive post processing, a Belgian politician claims a winning photoset should be disqualified due to its “serious distortion of reality”.
The mayor of Charleroi, where the winning photos of the “Contemporary Issues Stories” category were taken, justified his request to have the award withdrawn saying that the photos hurt not only the people of Charleroi but also the profession of photojournalism.
World Press Photo is currently verifying the facts behind the photos of Italian winner, Giovanni Troilo.
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