Dana Lixenberg wins this year’s Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize

Dutch photographer Dana Lixenberg has won the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize for her series Imperial Courts, which we featured on the site earlier this year.

Across 393 photos taken in black and white, Imperial Courts depicts the everyday existence of an inner-city community in a social housing project in Los Angeles from 1993 to 2015. The project began in 1992, when Dana travelled to the area to shoot a story by Dutch publication Vrij Nederland during the aftermath of race riots which erupted after the acquittal of four LAPD officers who were filmed beating Rodney King. The images were brought together in a monograph by ROMA Publications in 2015 and a 69-minute, three-channel video projection which sits on a purpose-built website creating a detailed account of the area’s residents.

The Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize is awarded every year to a living artist of any nationality “who has made the most significant contribution, either through an exhibition or publication, to the photography in Europe in the previous year”. This year, Sophie Calle, Awoiska van der Molen, and Taiyo Onorato & Nico Krebs were also nominated. The exhibition will remain on view at The Photographers’ Gallery in London until 11 June before travelling to the MMK Museum Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt am Main and Aperture in New York