Zanele Muholi, Lerato Dumse KwaThema Springs Johannesburg 2010

Hasselblad Award 2026

Photo: warmly congratulates Zanele Muholi on being named the 2026 laureate of the Hasselblad Award — widely regarded as the most significant prize in the history of photography. Muholi becomes one of three African photographers to receive this honour, and in doing so, marks a turning point not only for their own extraordinary career, but for how the global photographic community recognises work rooted in the African continent and its communities.

The Hasselblad Award, now in its 46th year, carries a prize of ZAR3 591 276.00 ,a gold medal, a Hasselblad camera, and a major solo exhibition at the Hasselblad Center in Gothenburg, Sweden.

At Photo:, we have long believed that urgent and consequential image-making in the world today is happening across the African continent. Zanele Muholi’s award is not simply a recognition of an individual — it is an acknowledgement by the international photographic establishment that work born in Umlazi and built in collaboration with Black LGBTQIA+ communities in South Africa and beyond.

For many years, African photographers have produced work of profound social awareness and moral urgency, yet have remained underrepresented in the structures of recognition, collections, and curricula that shape how the discipline understands itself. Muholi’s laureateship places a responsibility on all institutions and platforms invested in the photographic ecosystem to ensure that this recognition is not an exception, but a beginning.

Muholi’s practice exemplifies what Photo: holds central: that photography is not merely an art form, but an act of creation, of community-building, and of resistance. Through series such as Faces and Phases and Somnyama Ngonyama, they have built a visual archive — a counter-history — asserting the dignity, complexity, and full humanity of those the dominant image-world has too long rendered invisible.

Photo: was founded on the conviction that the photographers of the African continent deserve platforms, peer communities, and sustained institutional investment in their development. Through initiatives such as our 10:10 peer review programme — connecting emerging photographers across 15 countries on the continent — we work to build the conditions in which the next generation of image-makers can develop with rigour, with support, and in dialogue with one another.

Muholi’s trajectory is both an inspiration and a reminder of what becomes possible when photographers are given the space, the mentorship, and the community to develop their vision fully. We are deeply proud to work in the same ecosystem that shaped them.

We extend our warmest congratulations to Zanele Muholi the communities whose lives and stories are at the heart of this work. This award belongs to all of them.

About the Hasselblad Award: The Hasselblad Award has been presented annually since 1980 by the Hasselblad Foundation and is widely regarded as the world’s largest and most prestigious award in photography. The 2026 prize includes ZAR3 591 276.00 ,a gold medal, a Hasselblad camera, and a solo exhibition at the Hasselblad Center, Gothenburg (10 October 2026 – 4 April 2027).

18 March