Photographer Khanh Phan (Photo: ptkhanhhvnh/Instagram)
A photo competition themed “Work 2020”, organized by the famous Agora photo application, received 9,767 photos from both professional and amateur photographers around the world.
In early March, Agora announced Khanh Phan, submitting the photo "Washing water lilies", winning the most voted photo award, worth USD1,000.
The photo shows a woman washing water lilies in Chau Doc district, An Giang province. In floating season, people often use boats to go everywhere to harvest water lilies, then wash them and bring them to the market to sell or make food for their families. This is a traditional work of women in Western region for many generations and the lily is an ingredient processed into delicacies for daily consumption as well as for receiving guests.
The annual floating season in Vietnam’s Western region, usually from August to November, is also a tourist season when visitors from everywhere come to enjoy the immense watery scenery in the field. Not only the fish season, but the floating season also gives the local residents typical products such as water lilies, sesbania sesban flowers.
Ms. Khanh Phan shared that she was very happy and surprised when her photo was voted as the most beautiful working picture in the world by Agora. Each theme of Agora usually has thousands of submissions from around the world, but only one winning photo is selected. Firstly, the top 50 photos will be chosen for everyone to vote to select the winning photo. And she had the highest number of votes.
The photo "Washing water lilies" marks the third time she has won a photo award organized by Agora. The two previous awards were about the themes of “Music 2019” and “Golden Hour 2020”.
Khanh Phan was born in Quynh Phu district in the northern province of Thai Binh. Currently living in Ho Chi Minh city, in 2017, she bought her first camera to start her passion for photography.
She said that her journey to photography was not easy. She often goes to take photos alone in places with difficult conditions such as climbing, wading through the mud, waiting for dawn in a graveyard, or being hit by waves at Rai cave in Ninh Thuan province’s Phan Rang city. Sometimes she forgets herself as a woman.
However, photographic trips throughout Vietnam during nearly three years have helped Khanh Phan achieve much success in pursuing the photographic career, and she has won 30 awards domestically and internationally./.