Turkish photographer wins top honour at 2025 Huawei XMAGE Awards

Never in his wildest dreams did Mehmet Emin Corus imagine that he would be on a world stage such as the Grand Palais in Paris. Even as he nurtured his passion for mobile photography through life’s hardships in the city of Tokat in Turkey and enrolled in competitions, he didn’t bother getting a passport. In the end, it didn’t matter though. An image he took on his second-hand Huawei Mate 10 Pro crossed boundaries and emerged a winner at the 2025 Huawei Xmage Awards held in Paris last month.

Corus’ New Life, along with Ethereal Lines by Gheorge Popa from Romania and Origin of Skiing by China’s Chen Guanhong, was awarded the Grand Prize of the Year, filling out the top of the prestigious list of 100 winners, the Xmage 100. They fought off stiff competition from about 743,000 entries representing 78 countries and regions around the world and got the final nod from a nine-member jury that included Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Liu Heung Shing, Director of UK’s Photographers’ Gallery, Shoair Mavlian, and Director of Paris Photo, Florence Bourgeois.

“We first started the mobile imaging contest in 2017, and after nine years, it has grown into one of the most influential shows of its kind in the world,” said Kevin Ho, CEO of Huawei Consumer Business Group, during the unveiling of Xmage 100 in Paris. The awards returned to Grand Palais, the veritable meeting place for the arts, after a gap of six years, in collaboration with Paris Photo, one of the prominent photography showcases in the world. This is the third time the two parties have joined hands – and the first since Huawei unveiled its proprietary imaging technology Xmage in 2022 – to establish mobile photography as a rightful contender in the global art scene.

Under the theme, The World, You and Me, Xmage 100 unfurled a kaleidoscope of striking imagery and stunning frames that transcended boundaries and cultures, each offering a unique vantage point across eight innovative categories such as Faces, Colour & Shade, Storyboard and A Heartwarming World.

“This year, Xmage Awards has once again demonstrated the power of imagery to bridge distances, both literal and emotional,” said Bourgeois at the awards ceremony. “From capturing the delicate details of a macro moment to weaving visual narratives for group stories, each submission reflects a fragment of someone’s truth.”

To borrow Bourgeois’ words, every image was a conversation, a dialogue between the observer and the observed, between light and shadow, and between the photographer and the viewer.

If Corus’ New Life was a shot of an ordinary moment that hid extraordinary meaning and depth – of a farmer walking away with a newborn calf and its mother instinctively following with her eyes fixed on it, a picture of interdependence – then Ethereal Lines was surreal and other-worldly. Popa’s photo of the surface of a tailings lake that stores mining slurry in Geamana, taken with a Huawei Pura 80 Ultra, shocks and awes viewers with its abstract art-like images. Jury member Liu commented that the photo transcended conventional photography. “The textures defy our imagination of what chemical waste could look like and the result has invited viewers to pause and look deeper.”

It wasn’t just the works of the Grand Prize winners that stopped people in their tracks. From conceptual and abstract photography to portrait, landscape, architectural and everything in between, creations of the remaining 97 winners captivated the viewers.

Among them were works of UAE residents Mary Grace Montives and Mark Anthony Agtay.

Abu Dhabi-based Filipina expat Montives’ Ornate Tradition, a close-up of an Omani child in traditional attire and gold jewellery, won in the Faces category. “I’ve always been drawn to scenes that evoke a sense of stillness and depth – moments that remind us to pause and appreciate life’s subtleties,” she explained. “The inspiration for the image came from that genuine connection and innocence reflected in her smile, a reminder that the most powerful images often come from unguarded, real-life moments.”

The multimedia specialist credits her Huawei Pura 70’s advanced camera system for the exceptional clarity and detail even in a candid moment. “Features like fast autofocus and intelligent light adjustment ensured the photo retained its natural tones and textures, making it possible to capture a fleeting expression without compromise.”

For professional photographer and fellow Filipino expat Agtay, winning the award brought a wave of emotions, moments of disbelief followed by gratitude and profound appreciation. “It was humbling to know that my work resonated with the judges and stood out among such an incredible range of talent from around the world,” he said.

Having devoted his adult life to creating compelling photographs through constant study and exploration, balancing technical skill with artistic expression, he has been continually refining his style. His winning photograph, Life under the Light, captures a shared moment of waiting at Louvre Museum Abu Dhabi at sunset. “I wanted the image to reflect the subtle interplay between the environment, light, and human presence, and to highlight a story that often goes unnoticed,” he explained.

Nichole Fernandez, Visual Sociologist at University of Edinburgh and jury member, did notice and was impressed by how the sunlight transformed the mundane into something momentarily extraordinary. “It is an image that finds beauty in stillness, reminding us how photography, like waiting, turns time into observation and reflection,” she said. “What might otherwise feel mundane becomes worthy of capturing and remembering.”

With innovations in mobile imaging technology, as Bourgeois succinctly put it at the awards, companies like Huawei have placed unparalleled creative freedom in the hands of millions. It’s just a matter of pointing the camera at the world and making sense of it. And for Corus, that has opened new windows of opportunity.