On Saturday night, CPW’s newly renovated headquarters in Kingston was thrumming with the kind of conviction and camaraderie that comes from fighting for art in a moment of cultural austerity. The occasion was the 2025 CPW Vision Awards Gala, a sold-out celebration that honored five luminaries in the field of photography while raising urgently needed funds for programs under threat from federal arts funding cuts. (So far this year, CPW has lost over $129,000 in federal grants already fully approved by the agencies and their peer panels.)
CPW Executive Director Brian Wallis set the tone early, acknowledging the precarious landscape while reaffirming the organization’s defiant commitment to its mission. “Rather than yield, we intend to intensify our efforts,” Wallis told the crowd, invoking CPW’s founding values of equity, inclusion, and social change. “Photography can be an effective tool to foster self-empowerment and progressive social change.”
The Lifetime Achievement Award went to the legendary Sally Mann, who accepted the honor with her characteristic mix of erudition and irreverence, reading from the prologue to her book and likening the work of the artist to that of an insurance adjuster. “The art you make is your life, and the life you lead is your art,” she said. “We soldier on, alone… with only our dubiously accurate artistic compass as a guide—in which we place an appalling amount of faith.”
Fresh off a walk down the Met Gala red carpet, photographer Tyler Mitchell was on hand to accept the Photographer of the Year award. “It means a lot to be acknowledged by CPW, an extremely respected institution and community-building space,” Mitchell said. “I’m growing and learning as I make work that I hope does my generation some justice.”
Also honored was Qiana Mestrich, recipient of the Saltzman Prize for Emerging Photographer, who movingly dedicated her award to her mother and the unrecognized labor of women who shaped the Information Age. “Photography became a meditative practice… a way of running away to observe and understand the world beyond my own mind,” Mestrich said. “This latest body of political artwork is a love letter to my mom.”
Editors Lesley Martin and Pauline Vermare were awarded Photobook of the Year for I’m So Happy You Are Here: Japanese Women Photographers from the 1950s to Now, published by Aperture. “It’s very emotional to see this project realized,” said Vermare, noting the book’s groundbreaking effort to platform a generation of under-recognized women artists. “We’re very proud of this publication—with its 25 artists, 10 original essays, and 60 featured books.”
In addition to the awards and a festive dinner program, guests previewed the forthcoming exhibition “Larry Fink: Sensual Empathy,” curated by local luminary Lucy Sante, alongside “The Rose,” a feminist collage show, and “Flashpoint!,” a searing look at protest photobooks from around the globe. Local teens in CPW’s Place Corps Fellowship program will also present their work in “Developing Visions” this June.
It was an evening of celebration, yes—but also a reminder. As Wallis put it, “The values we uphold are the very terms now central to a great national debate about the meaning and value of culture.” CPW, for its part, isn’t backing down.
This article appears in May 2025.
