AAP Magazine #53 - TRAVELS 2025
Travels
Announcing Winners and Merit Awards
Winner's Gallery
Andrea Bettancini
01 The sound of silence
Mounted police officer in Maidan Park, Kolkata.
First Place winner
$500 Cash Prize
Italy
01 The sound of silence
Callie Eh
Beshik
A Kyrgyz mother, Meikin, is breastfeeding her child in a traditional cradle called a Beshik. This rocking cradle, made from juniper trees that symbolize long life, has been an important part of Kyrgyz traditions for generations.
Second Place Winner
$300 Cash Prize
Switzerland
Beshik
Andrea Peruzzi
The Guardian's gaze
At sunset, before the majestic Blue Mosque of Mazar-i-Sharif, a Taliban approaches to question my presence in the sacred courtyard. His piercing gaze embodies both faith and authority, the dual nature of one who believes and commands, protects and controls. Behind him, the turquoise tiles glow in the fading light, silent witnesses to an ancient devotion and a power intertwined with belief.
Afghanistan 2025
Third Place Winner
$200 Cash Prize
Italy
The Guardian's gaze
Merit Award's Gallery
Artem Postelnikov
Untitled
Kristyn Taylor
Early Morning with the Dasench Tribe, Ethiopia.
Early morning in the Omo delta, Ethiopia, and everyone in the Dasench Tribe is awake
Andrea Torrei
The Distance of Light
Early morning at the station. The first light touches a sign — Coca-Cola — a glimpse of the world arriving. Yangon, Myanmar
"The Distance of Light" explores the shifting space between people and places.
Travelling across Myanmar in 2018, I searched for what light reveals as it moves — not stories or spectacle, but quiet traces of presence and change, moments where the world opens and closes in the same breath.
Guillaume Petermann
Bird people
The Mohana, often called the “bird people,” are an indigenous community who have lived for generations on the waters of Lake Manchar, Pakistan’s largest freshwater lake. The most distinctive aspect of this community is their special bond with birds. Herons, cormorants, pelicans… Birds are at the heart of Mohana culture. This relationship reflects the community’s deep understanding of their environment, an echo of a connection that has endured for centuries.
Guillaume Petermann
France
Somenath Mukhopadhyay
Rose Fancy
Boys are spreading rose petals in the sun in Kannauj, the aroma capital of India to dry them for use as condiments in food preparation.
Somenath Mukhopadhyay
India
Indranil Sengupta
Make Up
A little girl is getting ready to participate in the annual "Gajan" festival of West Bengal, India.
Indranil Sengupta
India
Panvelvet
Untitled
Thibault Gerbaldi
Guardians of the Forest
Dayak warriors from Borneo reenact ancestral rituals that once celebrated unity, courage, and communion with nature. Their elaborate costumes — made of bark, beads, and hornbill feathers — honor the spirits that guard the forest and sustain life. Rooted in Kaharingan, the island’s ancient belief system, these ceremonies bridge the human and the spiritual worlds, preserving an identity deeply intertwined with the land.
Fiorella Baldisserri
Untitled
Brigitte Bourger
Turquoise XIV
My aerial photography is a visual voyage across protected marine zones, where nature’s beauty thrives in harmony with conservation.From above, the ocean reveals its secret geometry , shifting blues, delicate textures and patterns that tell stories of life and preservation. Each image is a quiet reminder of how fragile and magnificent our planet’s waters truly are.
Lise Leino
Portrait of a widow
In Huli society of Papua New Guinea, widows undergo specific rituals and practices that reflect their cultural beliefs and social structures. Widows cover their entire body with white clay to become unrecognisable to the spirit of their late husband to aid them in moving on and possibly remarrying. One of the significant parts of her ritual is the necklaces she's wearing made of seeds called Job's tears. The widow removes one seed each week, symbolizing the passage of time and end of mourning.
Ryan Kost
Camp Cook
Abel works diligently in camp Mitucocha at dusk, cooking dinner for 14 people on a simple two burner propane stove. We carried the stove for 13 days while trekking through the Cordillera Huayhuash Range in Peru. Everything is put on a team of donkeys and horses crossing passes over 16,600 feet.
Prescott Moore Lassman
Outside the Weaving Cooperative
From the photographic series "The Road to Machu Picchu" documenting a 2025 trip through the Sacred Valley of Peru to the fabled site of Machu Picchu. The trip began at Cusco during the Inti Raymi, the large Incan festival celebrating the winter solstice, and ended several days later at the mountaintop ruins of Machu Picchu high in the Andes mountains.
The Mogli
Don Mario
There was a busy road behind me and everyone said Hola to Don Mario. I asked if he was famous around here and he chuckled. This photo resembles his expression telling stories of hard work, heritage, and the enduring spirit of rural life while he takes a break in the tobacco fields.
Costanza Rossi
The Fathers of the Rite (Dassanech tribe, Omo Valley, Ethiopia)
The Dimi ceremony of the Dassanech in Ethiopia is a ritual linked to female genital mutilation, still practiced in parts of Africa, often performed with rudimentary tools that cause infections and death. The girls remain hidden inside huts as the fathers celebrate their passage into elder status, gaining prestige. This work invites reflection on morality, culture, and the limits of objectivity in understanding other worlds.
Carole Mills Noronha
Untitled
Orna Naor
Transylvania, Romania
Gypsies villages
Tj Vissing
Untitled
Emilie Favier
Legacy light
A suspended moment of a father and son on their backs, belonging to the Korowai ethnic group, in the middle of their jungle, their home, and an almost divine light. This ethnic group now has only one soldier, and their way of life, so close to nature, is disappearing.
Emilie Favier
France
Marika Poquet
A boy from the Bamyan Valley
Bamyan is a place that stays with you, not for its noise or crowds, but for its quiet weight.
It sits high in central Afghanistan, in the heart of the Hindu Kush, where the mountains feel old enough to remember everything.
The people of Bamyan are predominantly Hazara, a Shia ethnic group with Central Asian origins.
What stands out in Bamyan is the atmosphere.The city breathes slowly. And those who live here breathe with it. Bamyan does not ask to be remembered, yet it is difficult to forget
Sanghamitra Sarkar
BAJAO BOYS IN MANGROVE FOREST
hree joyful children of Bajao tribe playing in a mangrove forest by the sea. With water up to their knees and roots rising around them, they smile and pose freely, wearing simple goggles that hint at their adventurous spirit. The dense green trees behind them blend into the bright blue sky and the calm sea, creating a peaceful and lively scene. The boys seem at home in nature, enjoying the water and the moment without any distractions. Their laughter, curiosity, and connection to their environme
Sanghamitra Sarkar
India
Laura Jean Zito
Give Me Shelter
"Give Me Shelter" expresses the stress of climate change, the struggle for survival and the need for shelter and the comfort of others all in one image. The eerie tones of turquoise and ochre heighten the pitch of the sandstorm the Bedouin boy and his camel seek refuge from in the palm frond hoosha.
Laura Jean Zito
Ireland
Thank You!
