The Castelfiorentino Arts Prize – Contemporary Photography, sponsored by Ente Cambiano s.c.p.a., Fondazione Teatro del Popolo, and the Municipality of Castelfiorentino, announces the winners of its fifth edition.
The jury — composed of Vittore Buzzi and Michele Palazzi (Presidents), Giorgio Di Noto, Serena Nocentini, Chiara Ruberti, and Federica Sasso — selected the most outstanding projects from over 1,800 submissions coming from more than 90 countries, across the Open and Student categories.
The 2025 edition confirms the Prize as one of the key events in the field of contemporary photography, with growing international recognition. The selected works range from documentary and post-photographic research to hybrid and multimedia practices, exploring themes such as memory, identity, and new digital languages.
The Student category highlights the creative vitality of younger generations, eager to propose fresh and experimental approaches.
The Castelfiorentino Prize thus reaffirms its role as a privileged observatory on the evolution of contemporary photographic language, fostering dialogue between artistic research, local culture, and society.
Open Category
Winner: Tianyu Wang, Hiding and Seeking / Website – Instagram
Hiding and Seeking is a project that uses performance and photography to explore the invisible forms of violence and oppression that women experience within the domestic environment. Through postures, gestures, and everyday objects, the artist reconstructs and deconstructs the “positions” that patriarchal tradition imposes on the female body, turning personal experience into a political act. The images, suspended between reality and imagination, evoke a self that is imprisoned yet resistant, inviting reflection on the power dynamics hidden behind the façade of family life.
The winner of the Open category will receive a prize of €3,000.
Shortlisted in the exhibition:
Eleonora Agostini, A Study On Waitressing Website – Instagram
Mari Kolcheva, Meteorologica Instagram
Nicolò Rinaldi, W.E.I.R.D. (Wilderness Emulation Implicates Rapid Destruction) Website – Instagram
Alessandro Truffa, 432 Hz Website – Instagram
Student Category
Winner: Martina Andreoni, Personal artistic explanations as to why I would never ask a Sámi to handpick me a flower / Instagram
Personal artistic explanations as to why I would never ask a Sámi to handpick me a flower is a project developed in Karasjok, in Sápmi, the territory of the Sámi people. It reflects on the role of a non-indigenous gaze within a colonial context and on the power of photography as a historically oppressive tool. Divided into two series — group portraits of reindeer and images inspired by a local child’s drawing — the work explores the possibility of a respectful, slow, and conscious gaze.
The winner of the Student category will receive a prize of €500.
Shortlisted in the exhibition:
Camilla Aprile, L’infinito in cui siamo Instagram
Mirko Ostuni, Four to the dirt Instagram
Sara Petrillo, Pictures from Oil Instagram
Lorenzo Urgesi, Superstare: Unveiling Arcano Instagram
