Women 2021 – a photographic celebration

Photo: ©Elli Birch |

NEWS RELEASE: 8th March 2021

‘Women’ is a photographic celebration of images telling the stories and achievements of women and girls launching for International Women’s Day 2021

To mark International Women’s Day 2021 The British Press Photographers’ Association has curated a new exhibition of pictures telling the stories and highlighting the achievements of women and girls as recorded through the eyes of visual storytellers.



In accordance with the aims of International Women’s Day the exhibition seeks to celebrate the strength and achievement of women throughout society – socially, culturally, economically and politically.

The exhibition is a celebration of the achievements of women and exhibition organisers Vickie Flores and Isabel Infantes took the decision to include pictures taken by any of our members rather than just focussing on the view of women:

“One of the aims of the project was to make photographers of all genders think about how we portray women and to achieve equality and gender parity, we need the support of each other.”

Chair of The BPPA Lindsey Parnaby says:

“Press photographers are very fortunate to meet many inspirational women in the course of their work; women from all walks in life who shine brightly despite, at times, facing much adversity. Launched to coincide with International Women’s Day, The BPPA ‘Women’ is a visual celebration dedicated to just some those inspiring women of the world who personify female empowerment: images of their moments of triumph and strength captured by members of The BPPA.”


WOMEN is an online exhibition of 70 images, launching on 8th March 2021 and can be viewed at: https://women.thebppa.com

ABOUT INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY

International Women’s Day is a global day marked annually on 8th March celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women. The day also marks a call to action for accelerating gender parity.

Significant activity is witnessed worldwide as groups come together to celebrate women’s achievements or rally for women’s equality.

For more information visit: www.internationalwomensday.com

The BPPA was formed in 1984 by a small group of Fleet Street photographers to showcase the work that they were so passionate about. Over the next few years the association grew staging a series of hugely influential exhibitions and publishing three volumes of “Assignments” – collections of each year’s best work.


In 2003 we adopted a ‘mission statement’:

To promote and inspire the highest ethical, technical and creative standards from within the profession and raise awareness and appreciation of our industry outside it.

As of March 2021, the BPPA has 439 full members.

CURATORS OF WOMEN 2021
• Fiona Shields – The Guardian Head of Photography
• Gao Rongguo – China based Photographer and selected at Taylor Wessing Portrait Prize 2020
• Jakki Moores – News & Sports Press Segment Manager for Canon
• Jane Sherwood – Getty Images News Editor
• Milica Lamb – former Head of International and Entertainment at Press Association Media
• Rebecca Naden – Wales based News, Sports and Features Photographer for Thomson Reuters
• Rob Pinney – London based Photographer and founding editor of Point 5.1 Magazine

Image by: Milton Haworth

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

Vickie Flores: +44(0)7771 613 991 E: [email protected]

Isabel Infantes: +44(0)7795 350 975 E: [email protected]

Lindsey Parnaby +44(0)7815 737 443 E: [email protected]

An open response to a recent social media post about gender in press photography

The BPPA has come in for some criticism from a group called Women Photographers of the UK about what they refer to as the uneven representation of women in the current Assignments 2019 exhibition. You can read their open letter here on Medium. This is a response from Lynne Cameron, Vice Chair of The BPPA.
 
Dear Suzanne, Anna and Susannah
 
We would like to reassure those expressing concerns about the representation of women in our industry that we are very aware of the issues and are currently working on projects to support and help current and future female members of the organisation. We were disappointed that these concerns were not directed to The BPPA in the first instance as we welcome all constructive criticism. It is one of our core values to work transparently with all parties in any matter related to photography.
 
The issue of gender imbalance is a complex one, not just related to photography but to wider society.
 
The association is proactively working to improve such imbalances. As an example The BPPA elected me as Vice Chair and Julie Edwards as our Social Media and Website Editor at last year’s AGM. We are both long-standing professional photographers who have first hand experience of gender related issues within our industry. Julie and I are bringing our experiences, energy and ideas to The Board and welcome further positive constructive comments which could help address this wider topic.
 
In relation to the exhibition (it is not a competition) we would like to reassure those concerned that images were curated by highly regarded members of the profession who were deliberately not given any information about the name or gender of the photographers in order to make the selection process ‘about the images’ as far as is humanly possible.
 
We are extremely proud of Assignments – an exhibition designed to promote and highlight the amazing work that is being produced by our members.
 
The Board of The BPPA welcomes constructive input from anyone who wants to help to promote and inspire great photography. If you have ideas on what more can be done on the issues raised then please get in contact with me or any of the other members of our Board.
 
Lynne Cameron
 
Vice Chair, The BPPA
 
 
 
Statistics:
 
1. The BPPA has 321 paid-up members of whom 40 are women – which is approximately 12.46%.
2. 16 photographers joined or rejoined in order to take part in Assignments 2019 of whom 25% were women.
3. 161 photographers entered photographs for Assignments 2019 of whom 18 were women – 11.2%
4. 1,351 photographs were entered of which 148 were entered by women – 10.95%
5. 110 photographs were selected for exhibition of which 10 were by women – 9.3%