Press release

Storm is the theme of the eleventh cycle of the Prix Pictet, the world’s leading award dedicated to photography and sustainability. More than 350 nominators worldwide, including critics, curators and photography specialists, proposed artists whose work engages with this theme. An independent jury chaired by Sir David King reviewed the submissions, and the shortlist was announced at the Rencontres d’Arles in July 2025.

The exhibition brings together works by twelve shortlisted photographers. Storm functions both as a natural phenomenon and as a metaphor for the unseen and relentless forces shaping contemporary life. It reflects the volatility of our age, including environmental collapse, economic instability and social unrest, and evokes a world that often seems poised on the brink of crisis.

The photographers explore these turbulent conditions, capturing both immediate impact and broader consequences. Whether depicting climate disasters, displacement or the simmering tensions within divided societies, their work reveals not only disruption but also the generative potential within it, pointing to transformation, renewal and the hope that can emerge in its aftermath.

The shortlisted photographers are:

Takashi Arai, Exposed in a Hundred Suns, 2011–ongoing
Marina Caneve, Are They Rocks or Clouds?, 2015–19
Tom Fecht, Luciferines — entre chien et loup (Luciferines — Between Dog and Wolf), 2015– ongoing
Balazs Gardi, The Storm, 2020–21
Roberto Huarcaya, Amazogramas, 2014
Alfredo Jaar, The End, 2025
Belal Khaled, Hands Tell Stories, 2023–24
Hannah Modigh, Hurricane Season, 2012
Baudouin Mouanda, Ciel de saison (Seasonal Sky), 2020
Camille Seaman, The Big Cloud, 2008–14
Laetitia Vançon, Tribute to Odesa, 2022-23
Patrizia Zelano, Acqua Alta a Venezia (High Water in Venice), 2019 

Chilean artist Alfredo Jaar was announced as the winner of Storm for his 2025 series The End. The award ceremony and the opening of the shortlist exhibition took place at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London on 25 September 2025. The exhibition now tours to more than a dozen international venues, bringing the shortlisted works to audiences worldwide.

About Prix Pictet
Founded in Geneva in 2008 by the Pictet Group, Prix Pictet is widely recognised as the world’s leading prize for photography and sustainability. It is independently governed and administered by an independent secretariat and jury, supported by an advisory board.
For each cycle, the award focuses on a different theme that promotes discussion and debate on issues of sustainability. The independent jury creates a shortlist of twelve photographers based on artistic and photographic merit, originality in conception and/or execution, relevance to the current cycle’s theme, ability to address a pressing sustainability challenge, and ensuring their series is a unified and coherent body of work. The jury then selects the winner from the shortlist and a prize of 100,000 Swiss Francs is awarded for a body of work that speaks most powerfully to the theme.