Prince Claus Prize 2010

The Prince Claus Foundation for Culture and Development awarded with the Prince Claus Prize to the Mexican photographer Maya Goded-Colichio "for her insightful and intimate photography, for her willingness to challenge preconceived ideas through a sharp gaze that sheds light on little known realities; for her desire to celebrate otherness among mankind and willingness to go beyond socially constructed objectives." The Prize consists of a 25,000 euros (35,000 USD) purse that was awarded to Goded-Colichio in recognition of her artistic work with marginal communities. The most recent work by Goded-Colichio entitled Sexo-Servidoras (Sex Workers), was awarded the W. Eugene Smith Fund Award. She spent five years developing the project, to capture the life of prostitutes in Mexico City¿s La Merced neighborhood. With her photographs, the artist succeeded in conveying an insightful analysis of the life of women immersed in an environment of inequality, transgression, sexual exploitation; maternity, childhood, old age, beliefs, and notions of what it means to be loved or not. Born in Mexico City in 1970, Goded-Colichio began taking photographs at the age of 15. In 1993 she published her first book entitled Tierra Negra (Black Land), about a black community that lives by the Pacific coast of Oaxaca. The Foundation pointed out that Maya Goded-Colichio represents one in a long list of Mexican artists that have received the Prize; among these, painter Francisco Toledo (1940), and writer Carlos Monsiváis (1938-2010).