Sir David picks 12 photographers for sustainability prize

The shortlist for the Third Prix Pictet, the prize for photography and sustainability, was announced today. The theme for this year is 'Growth'. A preview of the shortlisted photographers' works is on show at Galerie Filles du Calvaire, Paris, until 29 November.

The winner will be announced by HE Kofi Annan at the award ceremony in Paris on 17 March 2011. The shortlist was chosen by an independent jury from submissions by over 450 photographers.

The eight-member jury is chaired by Professor Sir David King, Director of the Smith School of Enterprise and Environment at Oxford and an Ashden Advocate. Today's statement said the jury looked for photographic series of the highest artistic merit

that also presented a convincing narrative about the critical issues of sustainability and in particular, the theme of Growth. Growth, which lifts countless millions out of poverty, also has a huge and potentially unsustainable environmental cost. It presents one of the great conundrums facing humanity in the early decades of the twenty-first century.

Sir David said, "Any one of these twelve artists would be a worthy winner."