Vietnamese Photographers among 2023 Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year Winners

Three Vietnamese photographers have won prizes at the 2023 Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year, the world's leading food photography competition.

Hannah Nguyen

ngminhphuong26@gmail.com May 18, 2023 | 10:39

‘In the Storm’, by Khanh Phan Thi, Vietnam, won the Bring Home the Harvest category.

Once again, Vietnamese photographers achieved great success in this year’s competition, with a total of six finalist awards.

Most notably, Phan Thi Khanh was awarded First place in two categories. ‘In the Storm’, taken at Lap An Lagoon in Hue province in the dry season, won the Bring home the Harvest category. The image was also Highly Commended in the Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year (South East Asia) category, a category which a second image of Phan Thi Khanh’s, ‘Drying Fish’, also won.

The Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year (South East Asia) Award is an award category within the contest that recognises outstanding work by Southeast Asian photographers.

‘Drying Fish’, by Khanh Phan Thi, Vietnam, won the Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year (South East Asia) category.

Photographer Nguyen Tan Tuan was placed Second in the Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year (South East Asia) category and Tran Viet Van, was placed Third with "Niem vui gian di" (Simple Pleasure).

"Niem vui gian di" shows a happy man buying goods in a store in Old Havana. Cuba is a rare country where people can still buy goods with monthly stamps, like the subsidy period in Vietnam.

Viet Van is currently a journalist working for the Lao Dong (Labour) newspaper. He got a bachelor's degree from Hanoi Cultural University in 1996, according to VNA.

He started photography in 1998 and has so far won over 80 international photo prizes. He has also worked as a judge at many film festivals and photo contests in Vietnam.

Nguyen Tan Tuan is also a familiar face in many international photography contests. When he came to photography in 2015, he was fascinated with capturing the beautiful scenes of his homeland - Central Vietnam, especially the labor beauty of the local people.

He is currently living and working in Ho Chi Minh City. The photographer born in 1983 has won many works in international photo contests such as SkyPixel Awards 2018 & 2019, two photo finalists of the 17th annual Smithsonian magazine photo contest, 35Awards (2016-2017-2018-2019), Hero Sport Agora 2020 and many other.

Vietnamese Photographers among 2023 Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year Winners

A photograph titled “Niem vui gian di” taken by Tran Viet Van is placed Third in the Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year (South East Asia) category.

Meanwhile, Phan Thi Khanh was born in Quynh Phu district in the northern province of Thai Binh, but is now based in Ho Chi Minh City. In 2017, she bought her first camera, sparking her passion for photography.

Khanh Phan said her journey to become a photographer was not easy. She tends to venture into difficult conditions such as climbing high mountains, swimming in mud, or waiting for dawn at a graveyard to take photos.

However, the trip throughout Vietnam over the past three years has helped Khanh Phan gain a lot of success in pursuing a career in photography and win 30 domestic and international awards.

The winners of the 36 categories were announced by acclaimed chef, author and television presenter, Nadiya Hussain MBE, in an exciting Awards ceremony at BAFTA, London on Tuesday 16 May 2023. The ceremony was also live-streamed on the competition’s YouTube channel and was watched by an audience across the globe.

The Candy Man, by Jon Enoch, UK has been crowned Overall Winner of Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year 2023. The portrait captures Pappu Jaiswal, one of a number of candy-floss sellers in Mumbai, India.

An intensely powerful portrait, The Candy Man, by UK photographer Jon Enoch, has won the overall prize of Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year 2023.

Enoch’s photograph, taken in the streets of western Mumbai, captures one of the city’s many candy-floss sellers who use unique ways to display their candy goods in the hope of attracting a buyer.

"Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year continues to tell the world's most important food stories as we adjust again to a new normal. War in Europe, climate change, soaring inflation all to be grappled with,” says Phil Turnbull, CEO of APAL, owner of Pink Lady® and headline sponsor of the Awards since 2011. "But at the same time, we continue to grow, forage, cook, eat, celebrate, gather together, feast. Every year, the incredible winning images act as witness to the centrality of food in every culture in every people across the globe."

This year’s global judging panel, tasked with assessing the thousands of entries submitted from over 65 countries across the world, was chaired by legendary food photographer, David Loftus, and included Krishna Madhaven Pillai, Chief Editor, Better Photography Magazine, Fiona Shields, Head of Photography, Guardian News & Media, Chef Ian Kittichai, Restaurateur, Author & TV Host, Ella Ravilious, Curator, The V&A Museum and Nik Sharma, Cookbook author, Photographer, Columnist.

The exhibition of the 2023 Finalists will be premiering at The Royal Photographic Society, one of the world’s oldest photographic societies, in Bristol, England.