This is the fourth year the Riga Photography Biennial’s - NEXT and ISSP Gallery Award for young Baltic photographers has been presented. The goal of the award is to discover and appraise the creative efforts of young artists who demonstrate the power of the image in their works, offering an original point of view and conceptual depth, suited to the times. Award finalist’s work presentation evening provides an opportunity to take a look at the projects by 5 young artists of the Baltic States.

In 2021 Award for the competition ‘Seeking the Latest in Photography!’ has been presented to Visvaldas Morkevičius (Lithuania) for his series ‘Looking forward to meet Me’. The special prize – opportunity to publish a photography book with the NoRoutine Books publishing house was presented to Kristīne Krauze Slucka and her series ‘Vibrations of a material universe. Thirst of gold.’.

The award was presented by an internationally renowned jury – Saara Hacklin (FI), curator at the Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art; Valentinas Klimašauskas (LT), curator, writer and curator of the 14th Baltic Triennial; Adam Mazur (PL), art critic, art historian and curator; Elena Vaninetti (IT), curator and editor at YET Magazine; Audrey Hoareau (FR), artistic director of Photo Basel; Laura Toots (EE), Curator and project manager of Contemporary Art Museum of Estonia (EKKM) and Evita Goze (LV), artist, curator, journalist and ISSP Gallery representative.

Participants: Adelīna Kalniņa (LV), Audrius Kriaučiūnas (LT), Zanda Puče (LV),
Organizer: Riga Photography Biennial in cooperation with ISSP and Nordic Council of Ministers’ Office in Latvia
Image: Audrius Kriaučiūnas . From series ‘Lost moments’, 2020 – ongoing