Rebecca Vassie Memorial Award 2025 opens for applications

Submissions have opened for the sixth Rebecca Vassie Memorial Award for emerging photographers, which includes a cash bursary of ￡2,000.

The award, which funds an early-career photographer in the UK to undertake a new narrative photography project, also includes mentorship and support towards industry and public exposure. In addition, up to twelve longlisted applicants will join the trust’s Development Network, through which they become eligible for a series of smaller grants later this year.

Judges for the award include Caroline Hunter (picture editor, Guardian Saturday magazine), Emma Lynch (picture editor, BBC News Online) and Jennifer Thatcher (critic, curator and lecturer).

The award was created in memory of Rebecca Vassie, a British photographer and photojournalist who died suddenly, aged 30, while on assignment in Uganda in March 2015. This year’s award marks the tenth anniversary of Rebecca’s death; this announcement comes days after she would have turned 40.

Applicants for the award, who must be either from or based in the UK, are asked to submit a proposal setting out a compelling vision for a narrative photography project with a social or political context. The deadline for submissions is Monday 31 March 2025. Submission information here.

The winner of the award will receive ongoing support and mentorship from the Trust as they enact their winning proposal, as well as a portfolio review and mentorship from Karen Harvey MBE, founder and director of Shutter Hub.

Previous awards have been won by James Arthur Allen (2016), Kirsty Mackay (2017), Chrystal Ding (2018), Laura Page (2020) and Jamie Sinclair (2022).

• Allen documented Israel’s little-known ethnic Circassian population, one of the country’s only Islamic communities. The resulting work, ‘Adiga’, has been exhibited in London, published in the Calvert Journal and shortlisted for the RPS International Photography Exhibition.
• Mackay’s project, ‘The Fish That Never Swam’, looks at human stories behind the so-called “Glasgow effect”, the disparity in health and life expectancy in the city compared to UK averages. Her intimate portraits of people whose families were rehoused to estates at the outskirts of Glasgow have featured in the Observer newspaper. She has just published a book of the work.
• Ding spent time in Rwanda as the country marked 25 years since the 1994 genocide, in which Hutu extremists killed about 800,000 people. Ding combined portraits of survivors who are receiving therapy with their handwritten commentary on the therapeutic process. The work, ‘Yours Is Going To Be Healed As Well’, has been showcased on the BBC website.
• Page created ‘The Hidden Depths’, portraits and stories of older Britons, which subvert stereotypes and shine a fresh light on older life. The work has been showcased on the BBC and a new exhibition opens 4 March 2022 at Yorkshire Artspace, Persistence Works, Sheffield.
• Sinclair’s project ‘Hjem’ (‘home’) intimately narrated the experience of asylum seekers and refugees being settled into northern working class towns, with particular focus on the photographer’s hometown of Ashington. The work culminated in exhibitions at Museums Northumberland and London’s Photobook Cafe, and was featured on the home page of WeTransfer and at the Now Building on Tottenham Court Road.

Candidates longlisted for this year’s award gain access to the Rebecca Vassie Trust’s Development Network, which disburses small grants towards project development, professional training and public workshops delivered by network members, with special focus on creating education or enrichment opportunities for young people and marginalised communities. The Trust offers shortlisted candidates additional support-in-kind such as networking opportunities and online exhibition.

Kelly Vassie, founding trustee of the charity and sister to Rebecca, said: “This award launch is an especially poignant moment for us, marking ten years since we lost Beccy. It has been a privilege to engage with the narrative photography community over the past decade, supporting extraordinary and exhilarating work in the discipline to which Beccy was so devoted. We’d like to thank everyone who has supported us, and we look forward as ever to reading this year’s applications.”