“COVID-19 CHANGED NOT ONLY OUR LIVES BUT ALSO THE WORLD AS WE KNEW IT. SINCE EARLY 2020 I HAVE OFTEN RETURNED TO THE EPICENTRE OF THE PANDEMIC WITH THE AIM OF CREATING A BODY OF WORK NECESSARY FOR OUR COLLECTIVE AWARENESS AND THAT COULD ALSO STAND AS AN ICONOGRAPHIC MEMORY OF OUR TIME.” FABIO BUCCIARELLI

when the coronavirus was sweeping across northern Italy, Fabio bucciarelli gained exclusive access to Red Cross workers who were going door to door around bergamo, the region in Italy that was hit the hardest by the epidemic. Red Cross teams were checking in with those infected and were tasked to take the most serious cases to hospital. It was a devastatingly intimate view of the way the coronavirus was tearing apart family after family in the close-knit region. working in a hazmat suit, with goggles, gloves, and a respirator, bucciarelli traveled with the RC teams in an ambulance and got to enter the bedrooms, living rooms and kitchens of families ravaged by the virus. The simple surroundings he encountered belied the significance of what bergamo had become: at that time identified as the ground zero of the coronavirus epidemic worldwide. when children said their goodbyes to mothers, fathers and grandparents who were hoisted onto dollies and taken away, no one could know if it was for the last time. bucciarelli’s intimate work did not end at the front door, however. He visited overwhelmed intensive care wards and hospital corridors were covid-19 patients lined up. His connection with the families was so intense that, in the most tragic cases, they allowed him to accompany them to the cemeteries in the pared down yet poignant ceremonies that only the closest relatives could attend. bucciarelli was with them.

© FABIO BUCCIARELLI FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

America’s political divide may be nothing new but it was thrown into sharper focus than ever before by a string of violent protests during one of the most turbulent 12-month chapters in the nation’s history. Right-wing militias protesting the coronavirus lockdowns with their loaded assault rifles; black Lives Matter activists massing on the streets after the death of george Floyd; Trump supporters rampaging through the US Capitol after the president’s election defeat. The causes may have been different but the anger and sense of injustice burned every bit as strongly each time. Even though the right to bear arms in enshrined in the constitution, images of gunmen armed with assault rifles screaming in the face of police officers guarding Michigan’s state legislature are still jarring to behold back in April, 2020. The local governor, gretchen whitmer, was to later become the target of a botched kidnap plot by right-wing extremists as an act of revenge against lockdown measures. Restrictions on public gatherings failed to deter millions from taking to the streets over the summer after Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, died of asphyxiation as a white police officer knelt on his neck in the city of Minneapolis. Some of the most dramatic protests came in washington DC on June 1 where police sent a peaceful crowd running with pepper spray and teargas as President Donald Trump walked to a nearby church. The police however found themselves outnumbered at the other end of Constitution Avenue on January 6, 2021, when Trump’s supporters stormed the US Capitol right after attending a rally in which the outgoing president told the crowds that Joe biden had “stolen” power from him in November’s presidential election. As the dust begins to settle, the exhibition American democracy tested, featuring images from AFP photographers from across the United States, is an opportunity to reflect on how the world’s most powerful country can sometimes buckle under the strain of its internal divisions. CHRISTIAN OTTON | AFP

A JOURNEY THROUGH KYRGYZSTAN’S FRAGILE POST SOVIET DEMOCRACY. 2007-2010.
I remember seeing images of kyrgyzstan for the first time on the television in March 2005. There were scenes of excited Asian- looking men rushing toward an imposing Soviet style administration building. They entered the building, vandalizing, even pillaging, all they found. Then, on the roof, a scene of men proudly brandishing a flag. This event was called the “Tulip Revolution”. One could read in the press that the kyrgyz people, in their struggle for social justice, had just overthrown the authoritarian and corrupt regime of President Askar Akayev and had replaced him with kurmanbek bakiyev. It was only a few years later, when the small country was out of the limelight that I got to visit kyrgyzstan for the first time. Aided by a grant for young photographers, I set out to discover what the Tulip “Revolution” had actually achieved – western media narrative was that of a democratic transition in the country. This so-called revolution seemed to have been no more than a power grab. The elections were rigged; the media censured, perhaps even more than before; political opponents were arrested. kyrgyzstan was considered one of the 15 most corrupt countries in the world. Today one speaks of the Tulip Revolution as a coup d’état disguised as a popular revolution. I continued to visit the country in the course of several trips. I was confronted with the growing instability which eventually led to the bloody riots of April 2010. It was a new revolution, perhaps a bit more authentic this time. The nepotistic bakyiev was overthrown in his turn and found asylum in belorussia, as had Akayev five years earlier. A period of widespread unrest followed during which Osh, the major city in the South became the stage of ethnic anti-Uzbek pogroms. Some claimed that what the country was going through was no more than the painful apprenticeship of independence. WD

“Nobody leaves their home unless they are forced to leave their home, and that is what I try to show in these images.” There are so many untold stories and so many voices that were never heard. It is my responsibility as a photojournalist to be out there searching for these untold stories to document and share them with the world. If something happened and was never documented, it is as if it never existed. I have been searching for this for a decade and a half of my life. when I am telling their stories, I am also telling the story of my life. They are part of my life as I am part of theirs. For over a decade I have been documenting the refugee crisis in different parts of the world, their daily life and the challenges that refugees and internally displaced people are faced with. behind the word ‘refugee’ or ‘internally displaced person’ there are people who were forced to leave their homes, hopes, memories, and families behind to seek a new, safe home. with my photographs, I aim to bring awareness and change stereotypes and raise the voice of the people that I am photographing. It is never just a picture, it is a voice, it is a testimony and it is a message from a child or an adult from whatever part of the world to another part of the world, that lives forever. My focus is on children as I personally believe that children are the true victims of conflicts, they do not get to choose we they are born or the circumstances surrounding them. Children all over the world seek the same things in common, they seek fun, they seek joy and they seek happiness - no matter where they are. by portraying each child, instead of being called ‘the Afghan or the Syrian refugee boy and girl,’ they will be called and remembered by their names and ages, by their individual hopes and dreams. I do not just pass by and take pictures, I spend time, I invest and hope to make a difference, big or small – we have to start somewhere. It is not a 100m sprint, it is a marathon. Throughout this last decade I learned a lot from the youth, they are the most affected by armed conflicts. I was taught by them to feel fortunate and blessed, to appreciate being safe and healthy. I have witnessed hope through their eyes and hope is all they have. VOICES, is a selection of images captured over a decade and documenting the daily life and the challenges faced by refugees and internally displaced people in different parts of the world. It shows their journey while searching for a new safe home and settling down in their new environments. Images from Pakistan, Afghanistan, greece, Hungary, Croatia, Serbia, and Jordan. MM

One of them misses their bed. Another, their doll with the dark eyes. A third dreams of a time before the pillow was an enemy. The war in Syria has been going on for nine years. 2016 was the worst year so far for the children. At least 652 children were killed. More than two million children have been displaced within or outside the country. They had to leave their friends, their homes, and their beds. Some of these children have been invited to show where they now sleep, as all that once was no longer remains. MW

Manaus, the capital of the Amazon in brazil, is one of the hardest hit cities. According to official records, the country has lost more than 400,000 lives to the coronavirus. but in the absence of evidence proving otherwise, many families are quick to deny the possibility that covid-19 claimed their loved ones. This means that the official death toll is likely a vast undercount. As ambulances rumble across Manaus and backhoe loaders open new rows for more graves, the muggy air of this city in the banks of the majestic Amazon River feels even thicker than usual with such widespread denial. Manaus has seen nearly triple the normal number of deaths in April and May of 2020. Doctors and psychologists point that denial at the grassroots might be due to misinformation, lack of education, insufficient testing, and the conflicting messages from the leaderships. Chief among the sceptics is President Jair bolsonaro who has repeatedly called covid-19 a “minor flu” and claimed that concerns over the virus were overblown. In July, however, he himself became part of the statistics joining millions of brazilians infected with the coronavirus. FELIPE DANA | AP

Photojournalist José Sarmento Matos was the top prize winner of the 11th edition of the ESTAÇÃO IMAGEM AWARD which distinguishes the best of photojournalism. Matos documented the drama of a Portuguese-Venezuelan family in their migration back to Portugal, with images captured in Madeira and in the Caribbean country then facing a humanitarian crisis. The announcement of winners and award ceremony took place on the 18th of July at the Convent of São Francisco in Coimbra, an event hosted by the City Councillor for Culture, Carina Gomes, the jury chair, Patrick Chauvel, and the head of Estação Imagem, Luís Vasconcelos. For Photography of the Year, the jury chose a photo by Leonel de Castro, a photo that is part of his work on the devastation in the city of Beira after the passage of hurricane Idai in Mozambique. The photojournalist from Global Imagens also won the prize in the Contemporary Issues category and also an honourable mention in the Daily Life category whose first prize went to Gonçalo Fonseca. In the other five categories, the international jury awarded photojournalists Rui Duarte Silva / News, Ana Brígida / Art and Entertainment, Carlos Folgoso Sueiro / Environment, António Pedro Santos / Portrait Series, and Rodrigo Antunes / Sports. The Grant Estação Imagem 2020 Coimbra was awarded to photojournalist Ricardo Lopes with a project proposal on Portugal’s inlands and its rural traditions and popular knowledge that are on the verge of oblivion due to an aging and scattered population. The jury chooses the main winner of the ESTAÇÃO IMAGEM AWARD from among all the photo-reports submitted in the seven different categories. In the 2020 edition we had nearly 400 submissions, including reports and entries for the Photography of the Year category and a substantial increase of entries for the GRANT ESTAÇÃO IMAGEM Coimbra. For the first time meeting via online platforms only, the jury of the 11th edition of the ESTAÇÃO IMAGEM AWARD was chaired by Patrick Chauvel, the oldest active war reporter having covered more than 20 conflicts worldwide. The other members of the jury were Brent Stirton (seven World Press Photo awards, six Lucie awards, Visa d'Or and two United Nations awards), Felipe Dana (The Associated Press photojournalist and a Pulitzer finalist in 2017, 2018 and 2019), and João Silva (from the Bang Bang Club who documented the end of apartheid in South Africa, and a New York Times reporter.)

SPOTLIGHT ESTAÇÃO IMAGEM 2020 COIMBRA AWARD JOSÉ SARMENTO MATOS ABANDONING THE VENEZUELAN DREAM
This is the story of a Portuguese-Venezuelan family and their journey back to Portugal. They left Venezuela amidst the recent humanitarian crisis leaving behind their beloved ones and their identity, all to restart their lives. Until recently, Venezuela had been the home for more than half a million Portuguese and Portuguese-descendants. Many of these migrated in the 50s and 90s attracted by the prosperity brought by the oil boom in that Caribbean nation. A majority, however, has been returning to the Portuguese Island of Madeira where they have family ties. The report was shot in Venezuela and Portugal hence it covers the two-sides of their life-stories. JSM

As with the national health system (SNS) in general, São João Hospital in Porto was temporarily turned into a covid-19 hospital. In the initial phase and at the peak of the pandemic the Hospital hosted by far the largest number of covid-19 patients in the whole country. Its departments had to be quickly adapted to respond to the enormous challenge faced by the Portuguese health system. A collective and multidisciplinary effort where doctors, specialists, nurses and all other professionals left aside traditional roles and came together as a team with one mission: to rescue everyone from the clutches of a novel and unpredictable disease. For months, the gigantic unit was turned into a fiction-like setting. A quasi-apocalyptic scenario with patients in induced coma, staff in full protective gear, face shields, gloves and caps, and intubated patients connected to machines through which their blood was circulating to feed the failing lungs. A relentless push 24/7. At the centre of it all, a small device that sucks the blood and oxygen before returning it to the patient’s body. Men and women seemingly lost to an infection that took the world by shock. The vast majority of cases, however, survived without sequelae. An unexpected and challenging scenario to all health workers, without prior notice nor time for specific preparation. Swiftly, the SNS had to regroup. Too much pressure? “Not at all. Medical doctors are made for this. we’re on top of it”, summed up Roberto Roncon, Intensive Care coordinator, São João Hospital. JOSÉ AUGUSTO MOREIRA