Getty Images Announces 2013 Creative Grants Recipients

NEW YORK, June 24, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Getty Images is delighted to announce that photographers Jennifer Karady and Elley Ho, alongside agencies Fraser Communications and Heward Jue, Inc., have been selected to receive this year's Getty Images Creative Grants. The two teams, each consisting of a photographer and communications professional, will receive $20,000 to create compelling new imagery to strengthen the communications of a non-profit organization.  

• In the project Healing our Hidden War, Brooklyn, New York, based photographer Jennifer Karady and agency Fraser Communications will collaborate with Volunteers of America, Los Angeles (VOALA) to tell the stories of military veterans returning from deployments in Afghanistan and Iraq, revealing the invisible trauma of war and how it affects them. Animated by audio and motion, the narrative photographs aim to raise awareness about VOALA and the essential services it provides.
• Educating Children | Transforming Worlds, by California photographer Elley Ho and Creative Director Heward Jue will utilize video and print to demonstrate how the Asante Africa Foundation's education programs for children are profoundly transforming lives and communities in East Africa. The grant will enable Ho and Jue to shoot varying aspects of local life and utilize interview sound bites, split-screens, unique editing techniques and thoughtful typography to expose parallel worlds of children who receive a solid education and those who do not.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20121018/SF95656LOGO)

The projects will be showcased on Getty Images' www.gettyimages.com/grants.

"It is both inspiring and humbling to witness the powerful combination of creative thinking and commitment to advance social causes that this year's Creative Grants submissions represent," comments Andrew Saunders, Senior Vice President, Creative at Getty Images.

"The Creative Grants program plays an important role in encouraging the creation of influential campaigns that have the power to open people's eyes to worthy yet underrepresented causes the world over. I look forward to seeing the outcome of our recipients' efforts to promote education in Africa and encourage support for returning veterans, and ultimately raise the profile of these remarkable nonprofit organizations."

The 2013 Getty Images Creative Grants recipients were selected by an independent panel of leading industry professionals from Japan's creative industry, with judging taking place in Tokyo. The panel included:

• Kenji Shiratsuchi, Executive Officer, Dentsu
• David Morgan, Executive Creative Director, Ogilvy & Mather
• Toshiya Kono, Executive Creative Director, Hakuhodo Inc.

In addition to the two recipients, two other exceptional grant applications were commended by the judges:

• Photographers Joshua Bee Alafia and Jamel Shabazz, together with agency PR Noir from New York, were honored for their Rites of Passage proposal to support The Brotherhood/SisterSol (BHSS), which provides holistic, long-term support services for youth. Using video and the work of street photographer Jamel Shabazz to document the organization's Rites of Passage and arts programs, and youth organizing around political actions, the project aims to empower youth and strengthen the reach of The Brotherhood/SisterSol programs.
• New York-based photographer Katja Heinemann and Chicago agency Rosenbaum, Inc were commended for their proposal to support the AIDS Community Research Initiative of America (ACRIA), whose mission is to pioneer HIV health education and therapies and deliver these to those most in need. AIDS is Getting Old is an innovative advocacy campaign that utilizes formal portraiture and personal narratives to highlight the startling demographic shift in the pandemic: increasingly, older adults are living with HIV, yet their rising numbers and unique needs are being overlooked.

The Getty Images Creative Grants were created in 2009 to help nonprofits use the power of imagery to promote positive change in the world and help communicate their stories more effectively. In addition to the Creative Grants program, Getty Images also supports photographers, filmmakers and other communications professionals through a comprehensive and diverse range of grants including Grants for Editorial Photography; Emerging Talent Award; Getty Images and Chris Hondros Fund Award and the Contour by Getty Images Portrait Prize.

For more information about the Getty Images Creative Grants program, please visit www.gettyimages.com/grants which features the winners and finalists.

About Getty Images

Getty Images is among the world's leading creators and distributors of award-winning still imagery, video, music and multimedia products, as well as other forms of premium digital content, available through its trusted house of brands, including iStockphoto© and Thinkstock©. With its advanced search and image recognition technology, Getty Images serves business customers in more than 100 countries and is the first place creative and media professionals turn to discover, purchase and manage images and other digital content. Its best-in-class photographers and imagery help customers produce inspiring work which appears every day in the world's most influential newspapers, magazines, advertising campaigns, films, television programs, books and online media. Visit Getty Images at http://www.gettyimages.com/ to learn more about how the company is advancing the unique role of digital media in communications and business, and enabling creative ideas to come to life.  For the stories behind our content and our technology, visit the Getty Images Blog at blog.gettyimages.com. Find us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/gettyimages and Twitter at www.twitter.com/gettyimages.

SOURCE Getty Images, Inc.