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Photographs by students and alumni from around the world were featured in UQ’s School of Political Science and International Studies 2009 International Photo competition.

From Kabul to Kenya, East Timor to Ecuador, the photos demonstrate the diversity of the human condition in locations where graduates and undergraduates of the university have visited or worked.

Head of School, Associate Professor Gillian Whitehouse said, ‘The competition was designed to encourage students and alumni to reflect on the way images shape our understanding of politics, global events and cross cultural encounters.’
‘The judges faced a difficult task – there were numerous engaging and thought-provoking images.’

In the end the judges whittled down almost 40 entries to a shortlist of 15 and selected two winners – ‘Sticky Fingers’, taken by undergraduate Karishma Patel and ‘Ulaanbaatar Graduation’ taken by Alumnus Dan Miller.

After the presentation, Karishma said she was delighted that the judges had been as struck as she was by the image of two girls from an isolated community unable to escape the reach of modern day life.
‘I was bewildered there were no taps of running water yet non-biodegradable wrappers of (Haldiram) snacks littered the ground,’ she explained.

Dan was also pleased his photograph was selected as one of the winners, ‘I'm excited to know that my work will be on display at the School,’ he said.

One of the competition judges, Dr Seb Kaempf said, ‘ The reality of our lives today is that the way we look at and fathom the world we live in is increasingly mediated by pictures, films and video.

‘What the shortlisted candidates – and the two winners in particular – did really well was to capture, convey and display the (often hidden) political dimensions of photography, both in terms of content and aesthetics.’

All the shortlisted photographs will be given permanent homes around the School in the coming weeks.