Silk Cities Photo Festival 2025

Share your story of how you or your community rebuild life and recovery from major adversity or changes. It seeks to capture if and how communities and individuals rebuild, recover and revitalise their environments and their spirits after life-changing incidents such as disasters and wars, displacement, immigration and radical political changes.

Reconstruction covers many aspects of life, from rebuilding life after a major personal setback or life-changing events, to rebuilding physical buildings and urban assets, to forming new social networks in a new country, to seeking mental healing and redefining oneself. We seek to capture how communities and individuals rebuild, renew, and revitalise their environments and their spirits. Silk Cities invites you to submit visual stories in the form of photos that address recovery and resilience in its broader meaning whether it be physical, mental, social, economic, organisational and more.

This is the second Silk Cities photo event and will be in the form of a photo festival. The event will bring global stories of the art of survival and resilience, and aims to visually explore how individuals and communities rebuild their lives and recover whether to be at personal or collective levels.

Submitting photos to the Festival is free and open to the public, whether amateur or professional photographers. A juror committee will select review submissions and make selections for display on the Silk Cities Festival Digital Gallery open to the public.

Additionally, the selection board will select winners from a shortlist. Winners will enjoy extensive global exposure through various platforms and outputs while they remain the sole copyright holder of their photo at all times.

Awards

First place

Global exposure and unique experiences:

Featured in the Festival Digital Galley (open-access) Featured in the Festival eBook (open-access)
Featured in the Festival eBook (open-access & downloadable)
Announcing winners on the Silk Cities digital media and Festival eBook (Instagram, Facebook, & LinkedIn)
Display work in a side exhibition at the 5th Silk Cities International Conference
Complimentary registration to the 5th Silk Cities International Conference (worth over £300)
Certificate

Second place

Global exposure and unique experiences:

Featured in the Festival Digital Galley (open-access)
Featured in the Festival eBook (open-access & downloadable)
Announced on the Silk Cities digital media and Festival eBook (Instagram, Facebook, & LinkedIn)
Display work in a side exhibition at the 5th Silk Cities International Conference
Discounted registration to participate in the 5th Silk Cities Conference and its social events (worth £200)
Certificate

Third place

Global exposure and unique experiences:

Featured in the Festival Digital Galley (open-access)
Featured in the Festival eBook (open-access & downloadable)
Announced on the Silk Cities digital media and Festival eBook (Instagram, Facebook, & LinkedIn)
Display work in a side exhibition at the 5th Silk Cities International Conference
Discounted registration to participate in the 5th Silk Cities Conference and its social events (worth £100)
Certificate

Shortlisted entries

Global exposure:

Include work in the Festival Digital Galley (open-access)
Include work in the Festival eBook (open-access & downloadable)
Announced on the Silk Cities digital media and Festival eBook (Instagram, Facebook, & LinkedIn)
Display work in a side exhibition at the 5th Silk Cities International Conference

Other selected photos

Global exposure:

Include work in the Festival eBook (open-access & downloadable)
Display work in a side exhibition at the 5th Silk Cities International Conference (Subject to conditions)

Overview

Posters

Guidelines

Submission

FAQ

T&C

Criteria

Jury

Awards

Important Dates

Sara Niroobakhsh

Ali Ettehad

John Mullin

Wafaa Bilal