We are thrilled to announce  that our incredible artist Philip Holsinger is the 2025 recipient of the legendary Lucie Impact Award for his recent work in El Salvador. Holsinger has spent the past year traveling throughout El Salvador working on his book that documents the country's transformation.

The Lucie Awards were established in 2003 by Hossein Farmani to embody the Lucie Foundation's mission to honor master photographers, support professional excellence, nurture emerging talent through the International Photography Awards (IPA), and promote global appreciation for photography via the House of Lucie galleries. Since their creation, the Lucie Awards have celebrated around 172 of the most influential figures in contemporary photography at prestigious venues like Carnegie Hall in New York, recognizing their profound impact on our lives.

Philip Holsinger was presented by former Prime Minister of Haiti Laurent Lamothe. He honored Philip at the Lucie Awards and later on social media by saying "Form the Shepherds of Georgia, to the streets of Cite Soleil, Flip Holsinger captured dignity in forgotten places. His lense bore witness - not just to conflict, but to humanity. Tonight we honor a legend whose images moved the world. Thank you Flip."

Philip Holsinger, Acts of Mercy, Photograph Limited Edition of 5 with original hand written text, 40 x 60 in, $6,000 

"Philip, what will you write on the artwork above?"

"I would write something about the human form and the suffering man—that suffering is suffering (even if deserved, it is still a sadness). For me this photo feels like a Baroque image of mankind condemned to a life of toil and work because of the failure in the garden of Eden. For me the image is religious.”

Philip Holsinger is one of the only known people in the world to have access to these notorious prisoners and witness both the atrocities of their crimes and the difficulties of their current situation. These prisoners are currently residing in The Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT) in El Salvador - a concrete prison poured onto the side of a volcano.

"I want to give someone a reason to hang that photo on a wall as a universal symbol of something we all have in common. While they are murderers in the photo, they are also the damned. And like in that old movie Blade Runner, even the monster, in the end, understands something about the sacred reality of life and chooses to protect life. While these murderers are not protectors, I see in the form of their condemned bodies (for they are condemned: They will never see the sunlight again. They will never leave their cells alive, the form of a convulsing tree, the twisted pain of a landscape warped by war. As if my own spirit has become not like the individual killer, but the collective entanglement of shared pain."