Cycle 1 (2020-22) was launched in late 2020 with a focus on research into the history of women and photobooks from 1843 to 1999. The grantees (Yasmine Nachabe Taan, Faride Mereb, Uschi Klein) were announced in May of 2021 and the results presented in June of 2022. This page includes the original call for proposals, the announcement of the winners and the event for the final presentations.
The Cycle 1 Grantees:

Faride Mereb
Karmele Leizaola and Venezuelan Publishing
For more information about the grantee, click here.

Yasmine Nachabe Taan
Catherine Leroy’s Work in Beirut
For more information about the grantee, click here.

Uschi Klein
Clara Spitzer and Women Photographers in Communist Romania
For more information about the grantee, click here.
View video of 2021 Research Grantee Presentations.
The starting times for each grantee’s final presentation are:
Yasmine Nachabe Taan—00:05:28
Catherine Leroy’s Work in Beirut
Faride Mereb—00:27:35
Karmele Leizaola and Venezuelan Publishing
Uschi Klein—00:54:53
Clara Spitzer and Women Photographers in Communist Romania
Many thanks to our jurors, Anshika Varma, Ben Krewinkel and Daniel Boetker-Smith for their work in reviewing and considering the many proposals.
The jurors’ commented on the winners:
- The three selected proposals seek to expand not only the history of women practitioners in different parts of the world, but also on the life and format of what is understood as the photobook itself. All these projects show a desire to understand and create records for more contemporary understandings of the book.
- I’m looking forward to the new insights Sunyoung Kim’s research will provide into the work of female South Korean photographers and their hard efforts getting their work published in magazines in the 1960s.
- By having conversations with different bookmakers, viewed from the perspective of specific roles they occupy, Lin Junye will offer in-depth insights into a variety of aspects in the practice of bookmaking in Southeast Asia, something I can’t remember having read about before. Lin Junye’s research is an important study in the growing practice of independent publishing in Southeast Asia and I am certain her conversations with many practitioners is critical to create a record of a very important time in publishing from the region.
- One of the many fascinating aspects of Suryanandini Narain’s research is how she will link the role of the physical photo album to the way in which women in the Indian middle class shape their identity and position within patriarchal family life. Through Suryanandini’s work with the 50 women who are builders of their family albums, the position and historicity of the medium is centered to the form of this ephemera, responding to social structures under which the photo album is also the photobook.
The Cycle 1 Jurors:

Dr. Susan Bright is an Australian/British curator currently based in London. She was a curator at the National Portrait Gallery in London before deciding to work independently in the early 2000s. In 2007 she co-curated the landmark exhibition How We Are at Tate Britain. In the same year she curated Face of Fashion at the National Portrait Gallery, London. Other significant exhibitions include: Home Truths at The Photographers’ Gallery and the Foundling Museum in London. Her survey exhibition Feast for the Eyes toured to six major museums and galleries worldwide (2018-2021). From 2015-2017 she was a mentor for the Fondation d’entreprise Hermès and the Aperture Foundation partnership project ‘Immersion’. In 2019 Bright was guest curator for PHotoESPAÑA, and is currently co-curator of f/stop 9: Festival für Fotografie Leipzig 2021. She has authored and co-authored seven books.

Ingrid Masondo is the curator of photography and new media at the Iziko South African National Gallery (ISANG) in Cape Town, where she also served as Acting Director in 2017. Her focus at ISANG is to support the presentation and acquisition of works by invisibilised artists and communities. Her practice in the art and heritage sectors spans more than two decades and has encompassed artist and project management, production management, research, editing, curatorial and archiving work, particularly in photography and music. She has worked at the Market Photo Workshop, Chimurenga Chronic, UWC-Robben Island Mayibuye Archives, Making Music Productions and Badilisha Poetry Radio. She has counselled for Rape Crisis, been an organizer with Media Watch and is a founding member of the Cape Town Women’s Café and Groove Matters.

In May 2021 Sarah Meister became the Executive Director of Aperture. She has been a Curator in the Department of Photography at The Museum of Modern Art since 2009, where her most recent exhibitions include Fotoclubismo: Brazilian Modernist Photography, 1946-1964 (2021) and Dorothea Lange: Words & Pictures (2020). Other recent publications and projects have considered the work of Gordon Parks (2020), Luigi Ghirri (2020), and Frances Benjamin Johnston (2019). She is the co-director of the August Sander Project, a five year research initiative that will conclude in September 2021.
10×10’s Research Grants for 2021 were generously underwritten by the MUUS Collection, an organization with a mission to make visible their photography collection and archives through exhibitions, scholarship, donations, licensing, and the printing of images and books. Additional support was also provided by Richard Grosbard and David Solo, 10×10 Grants Director.