Jurors
2026 Critical Mass Prescreening Panel:
Alexa Becker — Photography Coach + Publishing Consultant, DGPh
Alexa Becker is a freelance consultant and editor who advises photographers on all aspects of their creative practice. After spending more than a decade with the renowned German photography and art book publisher Kehrer Verlag, she developed extensive expertise in photobook design, production, publishing, public relations, and marketing. Since 2008, Becker has reviewed portfolios and participated in juries and workshops at leading international photography festivals including Photolucida, FotoFest, and Rencontres d’Arles. A member of the German Society for Photography, she served on the jury for the Deutscher Fotobuchpreis in 2023 and 2025 and has been a regular reviewer for Critical Mass since 2010.
Borbála Jász — Vice-Director, PH21 Gallery, Barcelona
Borbála is a curator, art historian, philosopher of art, and educator. She serves as vice-director and curator of PH21 Gallery Barcelona, formerly in Budapest, where she creates international exhibition and career opportunities for photographers worldwide. She earned a PhD in Philosophy and Art History from Eötvös Loránd University and is pursuing a second doctorate in Aesthetics at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Her scholarship emphasizes the cultural, historical, and conceptual contexts of photography. She also brings extensive experience working with collectors, with deep knowledge of the artistic, legal, and practical dimensions of collections. She supports artists with insight globally.
Crista Dix — Executive Director, Griffin Museum of Photography
Crista Dix is the Executive Director at the Griffin Museum of Photography, assuming that role in January of 2022 after two years as the Associate Director.
Before coming to the Griffin Museum in 2020 she spent fifteen years operating her own photography gallery, wall space creative, closing it in 2020 to make the move to New England and the Griffin. Having a career spanning many paths she has a background rooted in science, business and creative art. This well rounded experience provides a solid background for supporting the Griffin’s mission to encourage a broader understanding and appreciation of the visual, emotional and social impact of photographic art.
Danny Sanchez — Associate Director, Themes+Projects Gallery
Danny is the associate director at Themes+Projects gallery (formally Modernbook). Since 2006, he has helped to cultivate the fine art careers of the gallery’s emerging talent in topics such as editing and sequencing, strategic analysis of a body of work for the current marketplace, pricing, and editioning, etc. Outside the gallery, he had the pleasure of being a reviewer for Review Santa Fe, Medium Photo, and PhotoAlliance; he was invited to guest curate for the San Francisco Art Dealer’s Association and participated as a panelist for the San Francisco Artist Network. Sanchez is a Bay Area native and earned his Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography from San Jose State University.
themes+projects.com | @themesandprojects
Draženka Jalšić — Senior Curator, Koprivnica Museum
Draženka is a Senior Curator at Koprivnica Museum, where she curates the museum’s art collections. She emphasizes graphic design, photography, and printing processes. She writes articles, critics, essays, and reviews on photography, the anthropology of photography, and visual communication. She writes on photography in professional and specialized magazines, portals, and online editions. Exhibition and portfolio reviews, essays, and selections on photography were in specialized websites and magazines in Europe and America. She is a member of the jury and photo curator in the Culture in Focus Annual Competition, the biennial of fine art photography Vizura, and the biennial of applied and commercial photography ProART.
Museum of Koprivnica | @djalsic
Elizabeth Avedon, Independent Curator + Photo Consultant
Elizabeth is an independent curator and photo consultant, often contributing to L’Oeil de la Photographie. Former director of Photo-eye Gallery and Creative Director for the Gere Foundation, Elizabeth has received recognition for her curatorial work, exhibition design, and publishing projects, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Amon Carter Museum, the Corcoran Gallery of Art, and Art Institute of Chicago. She’s juried for the Leica Women Foto Project Awards, the Lucie Photo Book Awards and the Prix Carmignac Fondation Photojournalism Award in Paris. In 2017, Elizabeth received a “Lifetime Achievement Award” from the Griffin Museum of Photography.
elizabethavedon.com | @elizabethavedon
Gail Fletcher — Photo Editor, The Guardian
Gail is a Photo Editor at The Guardian, where she develops and produces visual stories. She is on faculty at the International Center of Photography and was previously an Associate Photo Editor at National Geographic. She is originally from South Florida and holds a bachelor’s degree in history and government from Cornell University.
Karen Williams — Photo Director + Consultant
Karen Williams is a keynote speaker, course creator, and CEO and creator of Black Visual Queen, a company that is working to bring diversity to the photography industry. She has worked in the industry for over 15 years as a photo editor, not a photographer. She’s the decision-maker sitting in fancy rooms with top people debating which photographer to hire and why. She has had a hand in visual stories for dozens of iconic brands and is also a photography thought leader on LinkedIn, sharing her industry knowledge with her community there. In short, she knows what it takes for a photographer to get hired, and her mission is to help people get access to the information and resources they need to succeed in commercial photography. She lives in LA.
Black Visual Queen | @blackvisualqueen
Katie Lydiatt — Gallery Programming Manager, SPAO Photographic Arts Centre
Katie Lydiatt (she/her) is a curator, researcher, and arts administrator in Ottawa, Canada. She holds an MA in Art History from Carleton University, as well as a Curatorial Studies Diploma from the Institute for Comparative Studies in Literature, Art and Culture at Carleton. She has held positions at SAW Gallery and the Carleton University Art Gallery, and worked as a freelance researcher and editor on a number of photographic publications. She is currently the Gallery Manager at the SPAO: Photographic Arts Centre.
SPAO: Photographic Arts Centre
Lia J. Latty — Founder, Black Is Magazine
Lia is a photographer who strives to connect with others to share their voices as a collective and initiate dialogue about social issues. Her work has been exhibited in Baltimore, New York, and at MICA, where she recently received her BFA. Lia is also the founder of Black Is, a publication that publishes the stories and work of Black photographers worldwide. Black Is is dedicated to creating a platform to showcase Black photographers whose work speaks to the diversity of Black communities and Black people. The magazine acts as a place of discussion and an archival platform, keeping a database of all the Black photographers they interview/share their work.
Mary Bisbee-Beek — Owner + Director, READ/SEE!
Mary Bisbee–Beek has worked in book publishing for more than 40 years, with additional experience as a photo archivist at the Oakland Museum and as director of the Cartoon Art Museum in the San Francisco Bay Area. As a book publicist, she represents photographers, poets, literary novelists, and creative nonfiction authors. Through her Read/See office, she also offers Publishing Sherpa services, guiding authors and photographers in clarifying audience, identifying publishers, and shaping strategic next steps for publication projects. Her professional network and publishing contacts extend globally, supporting clients across a wide range of creative disciplines.
Ysabel Pinyol Blasi — Executive Director + Chief Curator, Monira Foundation
Ysabel Pinyol Blasi is the Executive Director and Curator at Monira Foundation and former Curatorial Director at Mana Contemporary, where she co-founded Mana Residencies. Originally from Barcelona, she has curated major international exhibitions and supported artists including LaToya Ruby Frazier and Machine Dazzle through residency programs. Pinyol is also an active writer, speaker, and portfolio reviewer for leading arts institutions such as RISD, Pratt, and NYFA.
Zsolt Batori — Director, PH21 Gallery, Barcelona
Zsolt is a curator, photographer, photography theorist, philosopher of art, and educator. He is the founder, director, and curator of PH21 Gallery Barcelona (formerly Budapest), which has presented international group and solo exhibitions for over a decade in Barcelona and Budapest, and has also organised exhibitions in collaboration with partner galleries in Rome and Jersey City. Zsolt has nurtured the careers of many photographers who received further exhibition and career opportunities after exhibiting at PH21 Gallery. After earning his PhD in Philosophy from Rutgers University, Zsolt has taught and conducted research at universities in Hungary, the USA, Argentina, and Spain, and his own photographic work has been exhibited internationally. Since 2023, he has served as a juror for Photolucida Critical Mass, and in 2026 he was invited to join Photolucida’s Board of Directors.
*Photolucida’s Program Director, Polly Gaillard, will also be on the prescreening team.
