{"id":6540,"date":"2022-05-26T12:40:29","date_gmt":"2022-05-26T12:40:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/2022.apw.gr\/apw-award-2022\/"},"modified":"2022-06-08T10:20:53","modified_gmt":"2022-06-08T10:20:53","slug":"apw-award-2022","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/2022.apw.gr\/en\/apw-award-2022\/","title":{"rendered":"APW Award 2022"},"content":{"rendered":"

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_custom_heading text=”Winner #APW 2022″ font_container=”tag:h2|text_align:center|color:%232baae2″ use_theme_fonts=”yes”][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row el_id=”patsouras”][vc_column width=”1\/2″][vc_column_text css_animation=”fadeInLeft”]<\/p>\n

Michalis Patsouras<\/h3>\n

My name is Michalis Patsouras, I live in Athens and I am a professional photographer. Before I got professionally involved in photography I worked for 10 years as a civil servant at the Greek Ministry of Commerce, while at the same time I studied photography and video art at the schools Focus and the Greek Leica Academy. In 2000 I resigned in order to dedicate myself professionally to photography. In 2001 I was hired as a chief photographer of the magazines of a large publishing group. In 2005 I started working with advertising agencies. All these years I have also been involved in travel reporting. Since 2009 I have been working as a freelance photographer, mainly on long-term anthropocentric projects, focusing on contemporary social issues. The way I like to work is experientially. From 2017 to 2021 I worked as a photography teacher for the Greek Leica Academy. I am a member of the Hellenic Photojournalist Association and FIVOS (collective organization for the protection of copyright in Greece).[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][vc_column width=”1\/2″][vc_single_image image=”6509″][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text css_animation=”fadeInLeft”]“Still human”<\/strong><\/p>\n

I met Stathis and Sylvia coincidentally, through a mutual friend, who thought that their life and the environment in which they lived would be of photographic interest to me. And indeed, the canvas of their lives, although damaged, brought out textures of great interest, just like themselves as personalities. In these people I saw a couple who, like many other couples around us, after years of being together, remain companions for each other, fellow travellers who… are exemplary of \u201cCan\u2019t live with them and can\u2019t live without them\u201d. She, a woman in love, full of sensitivity, who likes to write, listen to music and take care of him. He, the male, the \u201chunter\u201d, who (in his own way) will take care of their living, seeking to remain her hero forever. A giving person, who, despite the difficulties they face, doesn\u2019t mind sharing with you what they have, just… so as to please you. The photo shooting has been carried out over a period of about two years, during the quarantine. At some point their house burned down, which meant that for a short time they lived among the rubble, with only salvaged items the frame with the portrait of Stathis\u2019s mother, the photo albums with their souvenir photos and a silver cross, a keepsake from the period when Stathis worked as a silversmith. The photographic story ends when the couple, through a friend, finds accommodation in a caravan in a seaside area of Athens. In the society we live in, everything that annoys us may become invisible, but people like them continue to exist alongside us, continue to struggle for survival and remain human. And that is how we should treat them, avoiding unnecessary drama and sonorous conclusions.[\/vc_column_text][\/vc_column][\/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column]