World Photography Awards announce 2014 shortlist

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posted Tuesday, February 4, 2014 at 3:39 PM EDT

 
Image by Hasan Baglar

From a pool of almost 140,000 submissions, the World Photography Awards has announced its shortlist of entrants, winnowing out the best of the best, in the Professional, Open, and Youth categories. With images submitted from 166 countries, the team of judges has had to deal with the largest entry pool yet in the awards history, vying for prizes up to $25,000.

The shortlist of photos will be exhibited at Summerset House in London, in advance of the final decisions that are set to be made in March and April of this year. Each of the competitions three major divisions (Professional, Open, and Youth) have different categories, and different criteria—but also different prizes. The Open and Youth divisions are for smaller stakes, and will be judged earlier, while the Professionals will be up for the coveted L’Iris D’Or.

Of the many photographers who made it to the shortlist, some 15 of them are from the USA, 11 in the Professional division, and four in the Open:

Professional category finalists – for serious photographers and judged on a body of work

• Matthew Baum , Landscape

• Thomas Brummett, Conceptual

• Stacy Kranitz, People

• Sara Lewkowicz, Contemporary Issues

• Tony Hertz, Nature & Wildlife

• Michael Nichols, Nature & Wildlife

• Sophie Gamand, Portraiture

Professional category shortlist – for serious photographers and judged on a body of work

• Gesche Wuerfel, Architecture

• Glenna Gordon, Arts and Culture

• Melissa Golden, Current Affairs

• Stacy Kranitz, Current Affairs

• Marc Erwin Babej, Portraiture

Open categories – for enthusiasts and judged on a single image

• Ashley Cunningham, Low Light

• Samantha Fortenberry, Low Light

• Louise Porter, People

• John Stanmeyer, Split Second

You can see more of the finalists at the contests site, but we've included a handful of striking images to give you a taste of what's out there.

 
Be Cheerful Even in the Darkest of Times by Samantha Fortenberry
 
Samsara~ by Wolfgang Weinhardt
 
That's Dance, Sunward and Zeybeks by Hasan Baglar
 
Untitled by Louise Porter
 
Untitled, by Emmanuel Coupe-Kalomiris
 
Wet Dog 2 by Sophie Gamand
 
Homebound by Ata Mohammad Adnan
 
The Calm Before The Storm by Sean Batten
 
Beer festival in Munich by Li Hao