The international architectural photography award published by the Association of Hungarian Architects and the periodical Magyar Építőművészet (Hungarian Architecture) in June, 2017 attracted a total of 1,273 photos submitted by 137 authors from 34 countries of 5 continents. Entries were accepted in electronic format via an online platform created especially for this purpose. Entries were divided into two categories (professional and open) and had to be uploaded as either a pack of 5 individual photos or 5 series (each including maximum 6 images).

We invited representatives of Hungarian architecture as well as international professionals and famous photographers to act as jurors, namely Iwan Baan, Tamás Bujnovszky, Nicolas Grospierre, András Krizsán, Josef Schulz, Jan Stempel and György Szegő, as we felt this was a guarantee of the genuine openness of the award process. The jurors assessed online the images and series submitted in an electronic format relying on their own professional criteria as well as subjective concerns, and thus established a ranking order based on the overall achievement of each photographer (1 to 10 points). Based on the assessment of these evaluations the winners of the professional and open category were announced. The shortlist for the finals which was the result of the jurors’ votes included 10 photographers in both categories and thus we are hereby announcing one winner for each. in each respectively. Owing to his occupations, Iwan Baan could not take part in the jury’s activities in its very last stage.
As a recognition of Hungarian photographers’ activities who participated in the award in large numbers and submitted works of high standards, the managers of the award, the Association of Hungarian Architects and the periodical Magyar Építőművészet awarded to eight Hungarian photographers a certificate of merit.
There are two tendencies observable in architectural photography today, and the entries also reflect this. One of them is represented by technically perfect photos or series made by photographers who act as colleagues of architects, whilst the other is a photo or photo-essay recording the unrepeatable effects of light conditions, weather phenomena or other performance-like scenes or spectacles with the ambition to generate emotions. A version of the latter uses and stages characters, or applies means used in the finishing stages of photography, or even the approaches of experimental photography. As a rule, it is fairly easy to distinguish between the two types of motivations in „made-to-order” and purely „creative” photography. as a rule.
As managers of the award we successfully applied for a grant to cover the expenses and costs of the architectural award to the Visegrád Fund which supports co-operation between countries in Central Europe to connect their economies and cultures. Our partners in this project were the Prague-based CTU (Czech Technical University), the Association of Polish Architects and the Association of Slovak Architects. Thanks to this co-operation, the exhibition presenting the winning entries shall be hosted by the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland as well.

Results of the Architectural Photography Award 2017

The winner of the Professional category:

• Zhang Yong

Finalists of the Professional category:

• Laurian Ghinitoiu
• József Hajdú
• Radu Malasincu
• Catalin Marin
• Wang Ning
• Robert Pufleb
• Liang Shan
• Parham Taghioff
• Tamás Török

The winner of the Open category:

• Matt Portch

Finalists of the Open category:

• Aurelien Chen
• Anastasiia Gamalei
• Eszter Holló
• Kishan Kumar Thasma Seshier Kuppusamy
• Corentin Lespagnol
• Marcel Moonen
• Balázs Nagy
• Alexander Shmelkov
• Shigeru Takato

Certificates of merit have been awarded by MÉSZ-MÉ to:

• Zsolt Batár
• László Francsics
• Péter Gyukics
• Áron Lality
• Tamás Réthey-Prikkel
• Anita Sárosi
• Márton Domonkos Schneller
• Géza Seres

For the awarded photographs visit the website of the competition:
photoaward.meonline.hu

Photo: Zhang Yong: Shanghai Poly Grand Theater, Shanghai, China, 2014, digital photography, Architectural Photography Award 2017 – Winner, Professional category