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Through photography, I fulfill my purpose, giving voice to those who have none.

Azorean photographer Luís Godinho received recognition from the Federation of European Photographers (FEP) last April, winning the Silver Camera in the Reportage/Photojournalism category at the FEP Awards 2025.

The award was presented on April 26 at a ceremony in Copenhagen, Denmark, where he was also honored by APPImagem – Portuguese Association of Image Professionals.

This marks the seventh consecutive year that Luís Godinho, born in Angra do Heroísmo on Terceira Island, has reached the podium. During this time, he has won one bronze camera, four silver, and two gold.

The three awarded images this year (which you can see in the gallery above) reflect what the photographer’s lens and heart captured during his travels in Africa.

In an interview, Luís Godinho discussed the story behind each awarded photograph, as well as his life’s “purpose.”

I feel immense pride, but also motivation to keep telling stories

Last April, you won the Silver Camera in the Reportage/Photojournalism category at the FEP Awards 2025, promoted by the Federation of European Photographers (FEP). This is the seventh consecutive year you’re on the podium of this competition. How do you feel about so many achievements? Is there any pressure associated with these awards?

I think it shows some consistency in my work, and I feel immense pride, but also motivation to continue telling stories. Competing is important, and doing well is too, but awards do not drive me. Things happen naturally; they are a good vehicle to secure more work but, above all, telling the stories I tell, mostly about human rights, makes me happy and feel that I’m on the right path.

What advantages do awards like this bring?

It makes the phone ring more often [laughs]. Our name and work get talked about, it appears in the media, and it’s normal that it leads to more work somehow. One very important aspect is the sharing that ends up happening, especially during the galas. We meet many colleagues from other areas of photography and other countries, which I think is good networking. Personally, things have been going well, and I feel happy and grateful for all the recognitions achieved, but focused on the fact that the road is long.

How did you choose the photographs for the competition?

I tried to select some photographs that had good narratives but also that were important. I don’t do my work thinking about awards, but when a contest comes along and I want to compete, I look at what I have and try to figure out what might impact the jury the most. I had many stories, and it can be hard sometimes. We might have winner photographs tucked away, but we don’t know it. Sometimes it’s intuition or even an emotional connection. In this case, it was a bit of both.

The third and last photograph selected is very special to me. It’s of a boy whom I’ve been following and helping for some time

Tell us a little about the photos that awarded you the prize, their stories, the people…

In this specific contest, we can draw from photographs from previous years, as long as they have not been awarded before. Of the three selected, the first was taken in Senegal, during a humanitarian mission I went to photograph in 2016. It’s of a girl among tribes, alone, walking or playing, right under a giant baobab tree, where the shadows projected on the ground seemed to be its roots. The particularity of this photograph is that I had already photographed this same girl, whose image made me win the gold camera in 2023 with a photo of her face. This girl has a strong significance because she was the first child born at the hospital built by the AMI foundation, which volunteers were renovating at the time of the photograph.

The second photograph features a kid I have known for some time in São Tomé and Príncipe. Every time I visit for work, I find him there. The education system there differs from ours. Children only have classes in the morning or afternoon, depending on their grade, which gives them more free time to play and help their parents. In this case, Alito and his friends make charcoal in their free time to take home for their mothers to cook and also to sell.

The third and last photograph selected is very special to me. It’s of a boy named Edmilson at home and Osmar at school, an albino boy. Unfortunately, in many African countries, albinos are persecuted, massacred, and even killed, as having a piece of one is considered a good luck charm. Thankfully, this is not the case in São Tomé and Príncipe, but because of Edmilson’s conditions, I decided to help him. Besides paying for his school, providing school supplies and clothes, I also managed to help him in other ways, and this is where the power of photography comes in. Through the hundreds of photographs I take and the posts I make, I managed to gather some money with the help of acquaintances, buy him a bed because he was sleeping on the floor with his brother, and provide him the chance to have some medical consultations.

In the photograph in question, we were playing, and I was photographing him when he climbed a cocoa tree that was full of ants, so he took off his clothes and started cleaning himself because he was very itchy, and I photographed him at that moment.

What do you like photographing the most and why?

Undoubtedly people and their stories. Perhaps because I was raised in a huge family – my maternal grandmother, with whom I spent my childhood, had 16 children, and we are today around 20 cousins. Moreover, my first significant trips were to culturally diverse countries such as India, which I ended up visiting numerous times, and which fueled my desire to photograph people’s stories. Above all, understanding how they think and why, knowing that we are all the same, born and raised in different places and ways, but that it doesn’t matter at all. I feel that in doing this type of work, I am fulfilling my purpose, giving a voice to those who don’t have one, and trying to inspire people to be better through photography.

What is your next planned trip, and what do you intend to photograph?

I have many things planned and written, but at the moment, my biggest journey is the sprout [child] I have at home. But if nothing comes up before, it will be to São Tomé and Príncipe again. Until then, I have some reports to do in the Azores, again on topics that are not much talked about but need to be discussed.

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