Marisol Mendez has been announced as the winner of the 2026 Saltzman-Leibovitz Photography Prize for her project MADRE, receiving the top award of $15,000 USD.
Born in Cochabamba, Bolivia, Mendez’s photographic practice explores the tension between truth and fiction, examining how photographs construct meaning through folklore, mythology, memory and cultural identity. Her winning project MADRE combines Andean folklore with Catholic iconography while incorporating archival photographs from her own family album, reconnecting personal memory with matriarchal lineage.
Mendez said:
“When I told my mom about the nomination, she recognized Annie Leibovitz’s name as someone who had left a mark on me. I remember being enamoured by her images, which led me to embrace fiction and storytelling in my own work, especially when approaching complex subjects. After all, it is usually easier to understand love or time through a poem or song than through a chemistry lesson or the manual of a clock.”
She added:
“I’m moved by this incredible recognition. The Saltzman-Leibovitz Photography Prize allows me to continue telling my stories, and more importantly encourages me to do so on my own terms.”
The runner-up prize of $5,000 USD was awarded to Miranda Rae Barnes for Social Season, a series documenting Black debutante balls across the United States. Drawing on vernacular photography traditions, Barnes captures moments of celebration, elegance and generational continuity while reflecting on the historical policing of Black identity and self-presentation.
The 2026 nominators included Emma Bowkett, Zanele Muholi, Jennifer Pastore, Ivan Shaw and Leslie Simitch.
The jury for the 2026 prize included Deborah Aaronson, Phyllis Posnick, David Campany and Azu Nwagbogu.
Lisa Saltzman said:
“I established the Saltzman Leibovitz Prize in honour of my parents, Ralph and Muriel Saltzman — passionate art collectors, patrons and philanthropists — who taught me to pay attention: to art, to people, and to the world around us.”
She continued:
“Annie Leibovitz has spent a lifetime doing exactly that, finding the profound in the intimate and the monumental in the everyday. This prize is my way of carrying those legacies forward by supporting emerging artists as they discover their own ways of seeing. Being a photographer myself, I truly understand the importance of these opportunities.”
The Saltzman-Leibovitz Photography Prize was founded in 2025 by photographer and philanthropist Lisa Saltzman, through the Saltzman Family Foundation, in collaboration with the internationally renowned photographer Annie Leibovitz. It honours the legacy of Ralph and Muriel Saltzman, both deeply committed collectors and longstanding patrons of the arts.
The 2026 Prize celebrates the next generation of female visual storytellers, in honour of Annie Leibovitz’s book Women, and is designed to spotlight emerging talent at a pivotal moment in their creative journeys. For this edition, five international nominators from across the photography field have each proposed an exceptional artist, whose work will be judged by an esteemed jury.
A selection of works by the nominated artists will be exhibited at Photo London, Olympia, from 13th–17th May, 2026.
