Competition Results

IO-2: International Contemporary Daguerreotype Competition “Care – Daguerreotype Today: In an Age of Uncertainty”

We are pleased to announce the winners of IO-2: International Contemporary Daguerreotype Competition “Care – Daguerreotype Today: In an Age of Uncertainty.”

We received seventeen enthusiastic entries from six countries: Japan, the U.S., France, Sweden, Columbia, and Italy.
The competition was neck to neck, and all competitors were too good to be compared.
In our hearts, all participants are winners; we genuinely appreciate the one and only beauty of each submitted daguerreotype.
All winning works will be exhibited at PGI, Tokyo, along with featured daguerreotypes by Mike Robinson, Jerry Spagnoli, Binh Danh, Craig Tuffin, and Takashi Arai.

Grand Prize

Grant Romer (USA) for the daguerreotype “Corona” 

Semi-grand Prize

Yoko Mochizuki for the daguerreotype “Inner Peace”

Simone Choulle aka Nina Zaragoza et Hélène Vedrenne for the daguerreotype “A Shape of Me”

Åke Hultman for the series “I care 1&2”

Irving Pobboravsky Prize

Anton Orlov for the series “No More Turning Away” and “Parallels 1 & 2”

The show starts on October 7, 2021, and opens until November 16, 2021. For further details, please access PGI’s website:

Words from the jury:

The daguerreotype is one of the oldest processes in the history of photography. I am most grateful to be invited to participate in jurying this exhibition on the topic of “Care.” It is fascinating to see new work by so many innovative artists.


Anne Havinga, Senior Photography Curator at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Thank you all for your care and dedication to the medium of the daguerreotype. It is so rewarding to understand true achievement with this challenging medium.

Mike Robinson, Daguerreotypist
photo: Alexander Dzhus

Very nice work!

Jerry Spagnoli, Daguerreotypist

COVID-19 calamity forces us to live in the different flow of time. In such situations, daguerreotype and its process enable us to think about the distance and the relation between you and the others. Looking through the submitted works, I recognized that deeply.

Sayaka Takahashi, Director at PGI

About Irving Pobboravsky Award

Irving Pobboravsky is an American artist and daguerreotypist who was born in 1933. Throughout his carrier at the Rochester Institute of Technology, he intensely studied the daguerreotype process and became widely known among contemporary practitioners.
Commemorating his lifelong contribution to today’s daguerreotypists community and appreciating his selfless spirit to support the younger generation, we established Irving Pobboravsky Award to honor an artist who follows Irving’s path.

The Contemporary Daguerreotypes Japan Committee
Representative/ Takashi Arai