On 10 and 11 September 2014, the international jury met in the Primate´s Palace in Bratislava to evaluate the photos under the 3rd year of the contest for journalists SLOVAK PRESS PHOTO. The international jury was chaired by Paul Martinka (US/SK), photojournalist working for the New York Post. The other members of the jury were: Yuri Kozyrev (RU), world-famous photojournalist; Jindřich Štreit (CZ), photographer and university teacher; Jan Šibík (CZ), photojournalist; Roman Vondrouš (CZ), photographer, Jana Hojstričová (SK), photographer and a university teacher; and Pavel Neubauer (SK), photographer.
A total of 113 photographers registered with the contest, out of them sixteen coming from abroad, with altogether 1,115 photographs.
The contest consisted of eight categories (i.e. News, Daily Life, Reportage, Portrait, Nature, Sports, The World of Art, and Young Photographers up to 25 and Students) and one foreign category (Central European Photography). There was also a special category named Grant of the Capital City of the Slovak Republic Bratislava, under which the members of the jury selected three projects. The final winner of this category will be chosen by the Mayor of Bratislava.
Central European Photography was a brand new category of the 3rd year of the SLOVAK PRESS PHOTO contest. This category was open to photographers from the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Austria.
The main prize of the contest – the Grand Prix – was awarded to the Michal Burza, freelance photographer, for his image from the Maidan story.
The jury members appreciated the high quality of the enrolled photos. As for topics, photo stories covering the presidential elections in Slovakia and the events in Ukraine prevailed. The student category surprised all the jurors, as it provoked the biggest debates, all of them having appreciated greatly the high quality of the shots competing under this category.
The results of the journalist photography contest will be officially announced on 22 October 2014 at the SLOVAK PRESS PHOTO prize-awarding ceremony in the Mirror Hall of the Primate´s Palace in Bratislava.
