↑Tamara Abdul Hadi, Re-Imagining Return to the Marshes, 2025, installation view at Doris McCarthy Gallery - Instructional Centre Vitrines. Courtesy of the artist and Doris McCarthy Gallery
Tamara Abdul Hadi awarded the 2025 Gattuso Prize
The annual Gattuso Prize is awarded to one early-career CONTACT Festival artist whose work in the prior year’s Festival demonstrates promise and dedication to a rigorous lens-based practice. The award comprises a $5,000 prize and a future project with the festival.
Hadi's exhibition Re-Imagining Return to the Marshes at Doris McCarthy Gallery was part of the Core Program in the 2025 Festival.
Tamara Abdul Hadi is an Iraqi photographer whose work is concerned with the historic and contemporary representation of her own culture, in its diversity. Along with being a photographer, Abdul Hadi is an educator who has taught in Palestine, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, the UAE, Kuwait, Tunisia, and Canada. Her work has been published extensively in mainstream media, though she now prefers to work for more independent entities. Her photography and commentary focus on the dispossessed and marginalized, the underside of Orientalist representations, the underground of settler societies, and the changing social and environmental landscapes of the Middle East.
The Gattuso Prize formerly acknowledged an outstanding artist in the Juried Call Exhibition program of the CONTACT Photography Festival. Juried Call Exhibitions were selected to be part of the Festival through a submission process and are independently organized by artists, venues, and organizations across the city.
CONTACT gratefully acknowledges the generous support and contributions of La Fondation Emmanuelle Gattuso. The Foundation demonstrates strong leadership and influences innovation across all charitable sectors in Canada including healthcare, culture and the arts.
Past Winners
2024
Lorna Bauer
2023
2022
2021
Anthony Gebrehiwot, From Boys to Men: The Road to Healing, Doris McCarthy Gallery – Instructional Centre Vitrines
2020
Aaron Jones, Closed Fist, Open Palm, Zalucky Contemporary
2019
Sophie Sabet, I Almost Didn't Feel You Leave, Bradley Museum
2018
Shadi Harouni and Elise Rasmussen, With an instinct for justice, Doris McCarthy Gallery
2017
Sandra Brewster, It's all a blur…, Georgia Scherman Projects 2016 Lee Henderson, Never Letting Us Take Breath, Zalucky Contemporary
2015
Jimmy Limit, Surplus, Clint Roenisch Gallery
2014
Nadia Belerique, Have You Seen This Man, Daniel Faria Gallery
2013
Marlene Creates, selected works from 30 years, 1982-2012, Paul Petro Contemporary Art
2012
Lise Beaudry, Sur la glace / Walking on Ice, Art Gallery Of Mississauga
2011
Andrew Wright, CORONAE, Peak Gallery