PEOPLE – The Single Photos Category at the URBAN Photo Awards

The PEOPLE category in the Single Photos section is one of the most fertile and wide-ranging strands in the URBAN Photo Awards, a space where human presence becomes both visual material and a lens through which to read the urban world. Every human figure carries with it the context in which it exists: the streets, the architecture, the relationships that shape it.

PEOPLE embraces a broad spectrum of approaches, from portraiture — a psychological inquiry capable of capturing character and inner life — to fashion, lifestyle, nude, boudoir and wedding photography. But poses are only part of the picture: street photography adds a different dimension, one where the unexpected becomes an asset and the complexity of urban life reveals itself in its most authentic form. Different as their languages may be, every subcategory answers the same challenge: turning a human presence into a story.

Photographers are free to experiment with different techniques and styles, both in shooting and in post-production. Image processing is permitted, but excessive retouching is not allowed.

The Single Photos jury is led by Christopher Morris, one of the defining figures of international photojournalism. A founding member of VII Photo Agency and a contributor to TIME Magazine from 1990 to 2020, he has covered nearly thirty conflicts and the presidencies of Bush and Obama, earning recognition including the Robert Capa Gold Medal and multiple World Press Photo awards. His career has also taken him into the world of fashion: between 2009 and 2017 he documented shows and celebrities across Milan and Paris, bringing the same direct and incisive eye to a territory that, however different, never stops being about people.
ENTER NOW