Maria Panagiotidi, a lecturer in Cognitive Psychology at the University of Salford has been shortlisted for the 2020 British Photography Awards.
“I was completely taken aback to find out that my photo was shortlisted for the street photography category of the British Photography Awards. I’ve only been doing street photography for a few months and didn’t expect to get any sort of recognition at this stage. I feel honoured to be among so many talented photographers.”
Maria is being shortlisted in the street photography category of the awards, featuring her image ‘Couple on a Bus’.
“The selected photo depicts a couple on a bus. I was on a photowalk looking for interesting colours or people and that sweet moment my attention. The colours and the condensation on the window added extra layers to it. I had to run in the middle of the street to take that shot before the bus drove away. Only had one chance to get this right and I’m really happy with the result.”
She says that she chose to enter the competition because “unlike most photography competitions, the British photography awards support a number of charities.
“Photographers pay £5 to enter a photo and that amount goes to the charity of their choice, which is really nice and is one of the reasons I decided to submit a photo to the street photography category.”
Maria has been fascinated by photography from a young age.
She says: “I remember using my father’s camera when I was a child and being intrigued by light, shadows, and textures. Street photography is new to me though. I only found the courage to do it about 9-10 months ago.
“Pointing your camera towards strangers can be quite intimidating at first but it’s the best way to capture genuine life moments, especially in an era characterised by selfies and beauty filters.”
Maria says that she has had many opportunities to showcase her work over the past months.
“The last few months have been incredible! I had my first exhibition at GK gallery here in Salford, which went really well”.
“In addition to this, one of my photos was a runner-up at Picfair & MPB Photo Competition “Urban” a few months ago. Made it to the top 10 of over 4,100 submissions. That was quite unexpected!
“A photo of mine will also be displayed on The Manchester Open exhibition 2020 at Home [as part of the Push festival] starting January 2020.”
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