Awards
Ernesto Benavides wins first prize at the Sony World Photography Awards 2024
AFP Lima-based photographer Ernesto Benavides has won the first place of the Latin America Professional Award at the Sony World Photography Awards 2024 with his series called Captives.
The initiative, set up in collaboration with Sony Latin America, celebrates dynamic and inspiring photographic work currently created in the region.
“The Ayabaca pilgrimage is at the heart of deep-rooted Catholic traditions within the South American region. It is the largest pilgrimage in the continent and attracts thousands of faithful, including a specific type of fervent follower: criminals in search of redemption. I joined these pilgrims to explore and capture the performative image of their cathartic rituals, as they travelled to meet the Captive Lord, represented wearing a spiked crown as he is led to his crucifixion. Every year around May, the first pilgrims depart from southern Peru, heading north towards the highlands of Piura – a four-month walk covering more than 2,000 km. For these pilgrims, the body becomes theologically significant in the process of atoning for their sins, as if to wipe the slate clean for another year.”
Bio
Ernesto Benavides (1978) is a Peruvian documentary photographer working primarily within South America.
He holds a Bachelor of Science in Communication from the University of Lima and is a founding member of the photographic collective Supayfotos, exhibiting nationally and internationally since 2007.
Benavides currently works as a stringer photographer for the international news agency Agence France-Presse and his work has been published in media such as Wired, Audubon, The New York Times, Time, The Guardian, The Atavist Magazine, The New Yorker, The Washington Post, Grazzia, Brand eins, Le Monde, El País, Private, 6mois and Le Chasse Mare.
Benavides' work Presidential Vacancy, was awarded with 2nd place in the Spot News, Stories category of the 2021 World Press Photo Contest. His work Dredges was a finalist for the Oskar Barnack Leica Awards, won the bronze medal at the PX3 Prix de la Photographie, was presented at the screenings program of the Voices Off festival in Arles, won the 2017 Instituto Prensa y Sociedad (IPYS) and was included in the Songzhuang Chinese International Photo Biennale and presented in Colombia. In the same year, he was also awarded second place at the POY LATAM awards with his work, La Pampa, documenting the illegal mining fields in the Peruvian rainforest. Previous awards include Pictures of the Year International second prize in 2012, All Roads Photography Program of National Geographic in 2011 and the Inter American Press Association awards (IAPA).
His 2013 photobook Wanu was presented at the Indira festival in India, won second place in the IPA Awards and was a finalist in the Picture of the Year International awards in the category best photo book.