Two Australians shortlisted for world’s biggest photography competition

From a record number of entries of 230,103 images (up 33% from 2015), of which 127,098 were for the professional categories, two Australians were named in the shortlist for the world’s biggest photography competition, the Sony World Photography Awards.

The awards rewards and recognises the world’s best contemporary photography from the last year. Both photographers, Daniel Berehulak and Paul Ström, are completing in the professional categories – Berehulak in the People category and Ström in the Architecture category. The overall winner of the competition, the Photographer of the Year will win $25,000. The winners will be announced in London on 21 April.

Based in New Delhi, India, Berehulak’s series focusses on Mennonite farmers in Mexico and their ongoing struggles with water shortages. It looks at the challenges a group of Anabaptist Mennonites living in Chihuahua State in Northern Mexico face on a daily basis. Nearly a century after they migrated from Canada to Mexico, hundreds of Mennonites are trading the land they call home in search of cheaper land, where water is more plentiful.

Perth-based fineart and documentary photographer, Paul Ström’s shortlisted series, China's Expanding Urban Landscape, examines the architectural development on the outskirts of China's cities and explores how the new developments encroach on the landscape and how the nature needs to yield to the ever-expanding urbanisation of China.