JURY BIOS

Sabih Ahmed is a curator, writer and educator. He serves as the Director of the Ishara Art Foundation in Dubai where his work focuses on modern and contemporary art of South Asia mapped through diverse itineraries and inter-disciplinary formations. At Ishara, he has catalysed artist-led curations alongside his own curations that include Navjot Altaf: Pattern, and Notations on Time co-curated with Sandhini Poddar. Since 2023, he has been a guest faculty at the Teaching Artist Fellowship organised by the Department of Culture and Tourism, Abu Dhabi. He serves on the Advisory Board of the Sher-Gil Sundaram Arts Foundation in Delhi and his writings have been featured in a number of publications and journals. He is the co-author of Mass Traffic with Lantian Xie (Kunsthalle Bern and Mousse Publishing, 2023).

Clare Grafik is Head of Exhibitions at The Photographers’ Gallery in London. She has worked in public institutions including the ICA, Whitechapel, Hayward and National Portrait Gallery and with private collections. Group shows include The Photographic Object, Photography & Collage and Double Take: Photography & Drawing. Other projects include a solo exhibition with Bettina Von Zwehl at the Freud Museum and Pictures from the Garden in collaboration with Photo Oxford 2023. Contributions to books and catalogues include Alex Prager’s Silver Lake Drive (Chronicle Books, 2018) and more recently for Another Country (Thames and Hudson, 2022). She has been a Sessional Lecturer at Birkbeck College, London, and has lectured for institutions including University of the Arts, London, University of South Wales, and Sotheby’s Institute of Art.

Naeem Mohaiemen combines films, photography, drawings, and essays to research lonely families, unstable borders, and leftist uprisings in the Islamicate world after 1945. He is author of Midnight’s Third Child (Nokta: Dhaka, 2023), and co-editor (with Eszter Szakacs) of Solidarity Must be Defended (Tranzit: Budapest, 2023). Mohaiemen has exhibited/lectured in India at Sarai CSDS, New Delhi; Kiran Nadar Museum, New Delhi; School of Environment & Architecture, Mumbai; Studio Camp, Mumbai; Satyajit Ray Film & Television Institute, Kolkata; Kochi-Muziris Biennale, Kochi etc. Mohaiemen is represented by Experimenter, Kolkata/Mumbai. He is Head of the Photography Concentration at the School of Arts, Columbia University.

TERMS AND CONDITIONS

• All entries should be given a project title and should be accompanied by a short written statement (in English, in addition to your native language) describing the project as factually as possible.
• The material must be original and be presented as an actual book – a physical copy (if possible) and/or a digital format (PDF). Projects conceived as anthologies (rather than as clearly themed projects) are not acceptable. The photographer must hold the copyright of the work and must not have entered into any book publishing agreement in relation to the work being entered.
• Whilst the decision of the Advisory/Jury will be based on the quality of the project submission, this should not be interpreted in any way as acceptance by the publishers that the proposed format, page size, number of pages, number of photographs, any proposed texts or other aspects of the presentation will be appropriate or acceptable for the final publication. AFA in consultation with the winning project will determine the appropriate format and extent of the book.
• Each entrant agrees not to submit any entry that (1) infringes any third party’s proprietary rights, intellectual property rights, industrial property rights, personal or moral rights or any other rights, including without limitation, copyright, trademark, patent, trade secret, privacy, publicity, or confidentiality obligations; and (2) otherwise violates the applicable state, federal, provincial, or local law. Therefore, AFA also reserves the right to reconsider or not publish projects that have received the grant if in due course, before the realization of the project, any new information about any form of violation of the above comes to light.
• All materials must be delivered, at the photographer’s own risk to AFA. If not accepted, a provision to receive the book back will be made by the author.
• AFA’s decisions shall be final. AFA reserves the right to reject entries that are submitted without the required information, or that do not meet the criteria of eligibility, without any obligation to enter into any further discussion regarding their decisions.
• AFA accepts no responsibility for entries that are lost in transit.
• Details of particular entries may be at the discretion of AFA and may be released to the press as part of publicising the grant, including before the announcement of the awards.

ELIGIBILITY

• The fellowship is open to South Asia, and the focus of their suggested project should be from the region.
• It is open to all photographers above the age of 25 years. The applicant does not have to be a professional photographer.
• Applicants should not hold any other fellowship or grant relating to the proposed project. This is a one-time grant for this project.

POST SELECTION

• The winner will be notified as soon as a decision has been made. The deliberations of the jury will not be disclosed to anyone, including entrants.
• Within 10 days of notification the winning photographer will confirm in writing his or her acceptance of the Grant.
• The winner will provide the publishers with hi-res scans of the photographs for publicizing the work.
• While copyright of all work submitted for these awards remains with the respective entrants, the entrant grants to AFA a worldwide, irrevocable, and perpetual license to reproduce representative examples of the submitted entries in any of their publications, websites, and/or in any promotional material, strictly in connection with the Grant, and with reference to the photographer/artist, as relevant in each case; and to exhibit the books entered anywhere in the world for public display.

IMPORTANT

• Alkazi Foundation for the Arts will be credited as the grant giving organization which enables the publishing of the book, together with an imprint of its logo.
• AFA will work with the photographer to realize the final book.
• 25% of the total number of books produced by the author will be given to the Alkazi Foundation for promotion of the book.
• To assist in the promotion of the book, the winner will provide free of charge publicity rights for the publication.
• AFA will, wherever possible, seek to facilitate the release of the book. The photographer will also use his or her best efforts to research possible exhibition opportunities for the work.

Kindly write to us at alkazifoundation01@gmail.com for any queries.