Some photography doesn’t just show you the world—it sits you down and tells you the truth. This year’s winners of the W. Eugene Smith Grant prove exactly why humanistic photography still matters in a noisy, scroll-happy era. Now in its 46th year, the grant continues to back photographers who aren’t chasing likes, but meaning—work that lingers, questions, and refuses to look away.
The 2025 main grant goes to Maen Hammond, whose project Amira’s Castle is deeply personal and quietly powerful. Through the lives of his grandparents and his own documentation of the Palestinian present, Hammond builds a visual archive that feels both intimate and urgent. These aren’t distant headlines—these are memories, homes, and moments shaped by resilience. His work hits that rare sweet spot where family history and political reality collide, without ever feeling forced.
This year’s competition drew 657 entries from 74 countries, a reminder that powerful storytelling knows no borders. The jury selected six awardees across multiple grants, distributing significant funding to keep long-term projects alive. Two finalists, Rena Effendi and Stefanos Paikos, were recognized for projects that confront complex social realities with empathy and depth. Student grants went to Mumin Gul and Shubhadeep Mukherjee, signaling a strong future for documentary storytelling. The Howard Chapnick Grant was awarded to Uvas y Hojas, honoring leadership and integrity in the field.
Backed by longtime supporters and a legacy rooted in W. Eugene Smith’s own uncompromising vision, these grants do more than fund projects—they protect stories that might otherwise go untold. In a world drowning in images, these photographers remind us why some photos still stop us cold.
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#1. Maen Hammad, 2025 W. Eugene Smith Fund Grant Recipient
Amira’s Castle is an ongoing exploration of my grandparents’ lives—Amira and Mohammad—and my own documentation of the Palestinian present. At its center are three threads – my grandfather’s revolutionary archive, my grandmother’s daily practice of tending to the land they reclaimed, and my documentation of the struggle unfolding today. Together they form a dialogue across time, drawing the archive and the land into conversation—and pressing me to confront what my responsibility is in carrying those legacies forward today.
A photograph taken by my mother of my grandmother climbing a fig tree during one of her visits in Helhul, Palestine between 1988 and 1992.
The demolished home of the Nakhle family in the Jalazon refugee camp near the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah, 2023.
My grandfather speaking on the microphone in Tetuan, Morocco during a lecture on pan-Arabism in 1959 where he was organizing Moroccans recently liberated from Spanish colonization.
Apricot season on my grandmother’s land, 2025.
The funeral of Yasser al-Kasba, aged 17, who was shot and killed by an Israeli sniper, 2023.
My grandfather (top) and his friends at a spring in Tulkarem, Palestine while a university student sometime between 1946-1948.
Pomegranate season in my grandmother’s land in Helhul, Palestine, 2025.
The blood-stained cement of Awdeh Hathaleen’s body, a Palestinian activist and filmmaker killed by an Israeli settler, 2025.
#2. Rena Effendi, 2025 W. Eugene Smith Fund Grant Finalist
“Being named a Eugene Smith Grant finalist feels like recognition of not just of a single project, but of a responsibility to document a disappearing sea, honoring the lives and futures bound to it. The Caspian’s retreat is more than an environmental concern; it is a story of cultures and communities, and one rooted in my own memories of growing up on its shores and calling it home. I’m grateful for the chance to illuminate what is vanishing before our eyes.” — Rena Effendi
Shikhov beach, one of the last stretches of public shoreline near Baku, remains accessible while most of the Caspian coast has been privatized. Soviet-era oil rigs stand stagnant in the background, relics of decades of extraction. As water levels continue to fall and industrial development presses closer, places like this—where ordinary residents can still touch the sea—are becoming increasingly rare. Baku, July 2016.
A ship graveyard rusts into the waters off Nargin Island, just outside Baku Bay. Once engines of industry, these hulks now leach metal and oil into the sea, corroding as the Caspian itself recedes. They stand as reminders that the sea is both a resource and a dumping ground, carrying the weight of past exploitation into an uncertain future. Baku, 2006.
A Soviet-era statue of a robot stands outside an abandoned petrochemical factory in Sumgait, a city about 30 km (19 miles) north of Baku. Once a cradle of Soviet industrial might, its chemical plants are now largely derelict, spitting pollutants into the Caspian and leaving rusting relics to decay along the shore. Sumgait, 2007.
People rest along the newly reconstructed promenade by the Caspian Bay, known as the Baku Boulevard. In the background, international hotel chains rise above the waterfront, symbols of rapid development built on a fragile sea already shrinking under the pressure of climate change and decades of exploitation. Baku, July 2016.
A discarded gas mask floats in an oil puddle in Balakhani on the outskirts of Baku. Once at the center of the world’s first petroleum boom, the fields are now scarred by waste and neglect, their toxic pools a reminder of how deeply the Caspian’s shores bear the cost of extraction. Baku, 2010.
A boy from a community of the internally displaced flexing muscles by a Soviet-era oil rig in Balakhani village. Baku, Azerbaijan. 2010.
Balakhani, scarred by decades of oil extraction and littered with waste, reflects the lasting toll of industry on the Caspian’s fragile edge. Baku, 2010.
In Naftalan, crude petroleum long used in spa baths is drawn not from the Caspian but from inland oil fields. The spa’s “healing” black-oil treatments represent an intimate connection to Azerbaijan’s oil heritage, even as the Caspian Sea itself suffers decline. In Naftalan, about 330 km west of Baku, this facility treats conditions like arthritis and skin ailments with oil believed to have antiseptic and anti-inflammatory effects. 29 July 2016.
#3. Stefanos Paikos, 2025 W. Eugene Smith Fund Grant Finalist
“ Being named a W. Eugene Smith Grant Finalist is something I still struggle to fully grasp. I grew up looking at the work of photographers who received this grant, so to be recognised in the same tradition is deeply humbling. For me, the award is not only an honour but also a quiet reminder to stay with this work for the long term – to keep looking and listening carefully, and to approach the people and places I photograph with as much care and honesty as I can.
This recognition means a great deal to me both personally and professionally. To be selected from among so many strong voices feels like a real vote of confidence. The grant will not only help me to continue the work in a practical sense, it also gives me the courage to go further and to keep telling these stories with the time and attention they demand.”
Assos, Turkey, 2022. Inside an abandoned house on the Aegean coast, discarded clothes mark the traces of people who waited for clandestine crossings to Lesbos, Greece. Through the window they could see Europe, close enough to feel like freedom yet still out of reach.
Lampedusa, Italy, 2023. On a rocky beach, a tourist sunbathes and reads beside a rusted metal boat used by people who arrived days earlier, their clothes and makeshift flotation rings still scattered on the shore.
Dakar, Senegal, 2025. At the Mbeubeuss landfill, a young man carries a huge bundle of plastic down the hill while others sort through the trash behind him. For many, this exhausting work is an in-between stage, a way to earn enough money to perhaps take the next step and move on.
#4. Mumin Gul, 2025 W. Eugene Smith Student Grant Recipient
In the foothills of the Himalayas stands Kashmir, where mountains whisper tales of the past and the green valleys hold buried secrets in their folds. This region is known for its breathtaking beauty and political turmoil. Since 1947, Kashmir has been a disputed territory between India and Pakistan. Over the last few decades, it has become a symbol of tragedy and human suffering as a result of ongoing strife. The project, “Silent Whispers,” is primarily based in Indian-administered Kashmir. It is a visual exploration of the nuances of the Kashmir conflict and the lived realities of ordinary Kashmiris. These visuals examine the silence that has plagued the region while drawing attention to how militarization imprints itself onto civilian life, altering rhythms, routines, and the idea of home. The intensity of the conflict becomes most apparent in the quieter places, where everyday moments reveal the tension and uncertainty that often go unseen. The project presents a native’s point of view, emphasizing personal stories that are often overshadowed by media limitations. By portraying seldom-documented human emotions ranging from despair to wrath, the project intends to go beyond a mere collection of images; it highlights a spiritual drive of the people to survive and resist.
A boy reacts to getting scolded by other kids in Dargah, Srinagar, on 4th April 2019.
Frozen Dal Lake in Srinagar, Kashmir on 14 January 2021.
A bullet hole inside a room at the encounter site where two militants were killed in an operation in Srinagar’s Maloora on Monday, June 28.
An Indian military personnel checks a vehicle at a security checkpoint in Lal Chowk in Srinagar, Kashmir, on Nov. 19, 2021.
A boy fires a toy gun from the window of his house towards his friends as they run in Downtown, Kashmir, on Eid Ul Azha on 2nd August, 2020.
#5. Shubhadeep Mukherjee, 2025 W. Eugene Smith Student Grant Recipient
“In a university class assignment about our favourite photographers, I chose W. Eugene Smith. I remember spending hours on the foundation’s website, studying past winners and imagining what my own photographs might look like among them. It felt like a dream that albeit distant was yet inspiring. To now see my name associated with the W. Eugene Smith Student Grant is surreal. It’s a moment I once only envisioned, and to have it materialise feels both humbling and empowering. I’ve read the email over and over again, letting it sink in. It means more to me than I can put into words. I’m deeply grateful to the jury for this honour, and I hope to carry forward the spirit and integrity of Smith’s legacy through my own work. This grant is both a recognition and a responsibility that I’m excited to grow into.”—Shubhadeep Mukherjee
Unbox: An old family photograph that I found in my father’s box. He does not recognise the ones in the photo. Old age is overpowering his memory and, with a heavy voice, Baba narrates how he had lost his siblings the day after they had reached the Indian mainland. This photograph now stands as a testament to the untold stories of Partition, of families torn apart and lives forever altered. My father still keeps it in his old trunk that reminds him of his childhood and the playful evenings.
Keepsake: My mother holds a hand-painted, dried palm leaf hand fan, a quintessential item in a Bengali household. My mother’s family too was forced to flee their hometown. While my mother and all her siblings were born in India, she had heard stories from her father. This traditional hand fan has a cloth wrapped around the frills. Ma says that the cloth is from one of her grandmother’s saris that her mother had sewn onto it, just to preserve the memory of the childhood home—a poignant symbol of resilience and memory. The intimate scene evokes the enduring cultural practices that survivors carried across borders after the Partition of India. The brass tumbler by her side is a family heirloom that adds to the quiet narrative of displacement, survival, and the longing for a lost home.
Recollection: This is the photograph of Mr. Dilip Mukherjee (my father). There is barely any sunlight in our old apartment, and my father’s favourite spot is this window in my room, which remains unopened to the wind. I asked him to sit there and speak to me when I made this photograph. My father was five years old when one afternoon my grandfather stormed in and announced the plans to depart. At almost eighty, he has faint memories of his journey. He had barely spoken about his experiences earlier, and that day we spoke for almost two hours as he narrated those fond memories that he recollects with happiness. The child in my father also recollects the memory of crossing Jhalokathi in a steamer, and he had asked his father, “When are we coming back, Baba?”
#6. Uvas y Hojas, 2025 Howard Chapnick Grant Recipient
Uvas y Hojas is a cultural center and the only bookstore in El Pescadero, Baja California Sur. What began in 2021 as a small gathering of eight photographers in a walkway has blossomed into a vital community hub. Their monthly event, Foto Viernes, now brings together the work of a dedicated group of 22 local photographers, aged 16 to 80, to share and present free workshops for the public on everything from composition to visual storytelling. Uvas y Hojas is run and operated by Sandra Reyna, Dominic Bracco II, and Paco Oropeza.
Photographers share work at a Foto Viernes event at the original venue in 2023.
Sean Mosval performs a song during an open mic for poetry, corridos, and rap at Uvas y Hojas in October 2025.
Sandra Reyna.
Summary
What is the W. Eugene Smith Grant?
- It’s one of the most prestigious grants supporting humanistic and documentary photography worldwide.
Who won the main grant in 2025?
- Palestinian-American photographer Maen Hammond for his project Amira’s Castle.
How many photographers received awards this year?
- Six recipients were awarded across main, finalist, student, and leadership grants.
How much funding does the grant provide?
- The main grant is $30,000, with additional grants ranging from $5,000 to $10,000.
Why is this grant important?
- It supports long-term, socially engaged photography that gives voice to underrepresented stories.