Award judges, Athol McCredie, Claire Mabey and Neil Pardington choose these three books as equal winners of the Aotearoa Photobook Awards.

Winners

A Room in Whanganui
Photographer: Solomon Mortimer & Zahra Killeen-Chance
Publisher: Self published
Printer/binder: H&A Print
Designer: Solomon Mortimer

A Room in Whanganui is the result of the time Mortimer and Killeen-Chance spent at Tylee Cottage as part of a Sarjeant Gallery residency. The photographs explore the possibilities of the studio room of the cottage, playing with light, shadow and the human form to create compositions that border on abstraction. The final publication takes the form of a duplicate receipt book in the cottage’s signature cream and green. The pages have been manually pin perforated to allow the images to be easily removed.

Judges comments: A Room in Whanganui is such an outlier among our submissions in terms of approach: the creativity, the fun, and the joy encapsulated in the project, not to mention the way it plays with the idea of a duplicate receipt book. In many ways it is a high risk publication. The photographs are performative in nature, posed and using light to create frames within frames. The materiality of the object reinforces this performance art gesture, and requires a particular type of handling. As a reader, you can impact upon this book significantly, playing with the room presented within. The form also nods to the very nature of photography through the carbon copy and the invitation to tear out pages and disseminate the duplicates. This is an original idea delivered in an unexpected manner and it works incredibly well.

If you are interested in ordering a copy of A Room in Whanganui please either contact Anna Miles Gallery or DM Solomon on instagram @crispy.hedges

Droplet
Photographer: Sheryl Campbell
Publisher: self published
Designer: Sheryl Campbell
Writer: Sheryl Campbell

Droplet uses humour and theatricality to shine a light on sexism, objectification and assault in corporate New Zealand. Campbell’s background in commercial photography has allowed her to create sleek, saturated, and arresting imagery.

Judges comments: Droplet is conceptually and politically brilliant. It is a strong feminist work that gets to the bottom of a very serious issue, and the revelations of inappropriate sexual conduct at a well-known law firm will come as no surprise to many readers. The narrative from start to finish is surprising, impactful and moving, and uses commercial photography to shocking effect. It employs dark humour to communicate its message and draws upon a tradition of female activism in photography.

SLT
Photographer: Mark Purdom
Publisher: Ramp Press
Designer: areadesign.co.nz

SLT (short for Sustained Loss of Traction) uses Late Photography to investigate the phenomenon of burnouts. Late photography is closer to forensic photography than photojournalism or documentary approaches and focuses on the traces left behind by an event, rather than the event itself. For SLT this event is the burnout and the book brings together images of what these incidents of sustained loss of traction leave behind.

Judges comments: SLT is excellent in every aspect of its production. It is a forensic investigation of the subject and in a strange way is almost educational. The photography and design come together to form a complete whole, where the book form feels like the most appropriate outcome for the project. The simple, focused concept casts a new light on burnt-outs, transforming the rubber left by tyres into another kind of mark-making. In the words of one of the judges “It turns boy-racing into something beautiful, which I didn’t think was possible.”

Highly Commended Books

Between Dog and Wolf
Photographer: Jane Wilcox
Publisher: Bad News Books
Designers: Jane Wilcox, Harry Culy, Liam Collinson
Text: Caroline McQuarrie

Between Dog and Wolf revels in Wellington’s trees and plant-life in the liminal time of twilight. Wilcox’s deft handling of light and perspective within the landscape forces the reader to question whose eyes we are looking through and makes stark the magic of myth that is hinted at in the title.

Judges comments: From start to finish, Between Dog and Wolf is a beautifully realised book and the type of publication that keeps drawing you back for another look. The moment of transformation captured in the title is indicative of the work as a whole. Caroline McQuarrie’s essay is elliptical, connecting with the images and adding depth. The final object is focused and complete.

Motel Life
Photographer: Peter Black
Publisher: MMM Photobooks
Designer: Mary Macpherson and Peter Black
Text: Mary Macpherson
Printer: Wakefields Digital

Motel Life combines the poetic with the documentary in a survey of the allusive life of Aotearoa’s motels.

Judges comments: The photography and the pacing of Motel Life make it an instant favourite. The photographs are gorgeous and the printing is nice and consistent. Black handles the subject matter with a sense of humour and has a brilliant knack for capturing the sometimes banal nature of living.

mother lode
Photographer: Ann Shelton
Publisher: Bad News Books
Designer: Duncan Munro
Digital drawings: Ann Shelton and Duncan Munro
Text: Pip Adam and Ann Shelton

mother lode looks at alternative means of agricultural production through an investigation of the practices of Wairarapa Eco Farm, an example of community supported agriculture. Images of the wild, unstructured, abundance of the farm are quite different from the usual ordering of garden aesthetics. These photographs are juxtaposed with digital drawings which point to the unseen aspects of the depicted flora.

If you are interested in ordering a copy of Ann’s book mother lode please contact her at this email address.

Judges comments: mother lode is a beautiful example of what can happen when production, photography, design, and text come together in service of the same goal. It is visually beautiful, the type of book you fall in love with immediately and completely. The relationship between the drawing, the photographs, and the additional piece of fiction is excellent and brings together Shelton and Munro’s practices perfectly. This is a poetic take on the themes of growing, planting and ecology. The illustrations lead you into these themes through repetitive layouts and branching elements that come from a centre. Adam’s words really highlight the narrative potential of the imagery while the colours and design elements pull everything together and the aerial photograph at the end provides a sense of perspective. The distinctive font, heavy with symbolism, sets the tone really well; this is a symbolic piece of work that has grows out of all of the shapes in nature that people have created stories from for so long.

Shortlisted books

…and then there were none
Photographer/Author: Harvey Benge, Jon Carapiet, Lloyd Jones, Haru Sameshima, & Stu Sontier
Publisher: Rim Books
Designer: UnkleFranc Ltd
Text: Lloyd Jones

…and then there were none is a collaboration between four New Zealand photographers and one writer that breaks out of conventional storytelling to explore the authors’ doubts and anxieties about the world around them. The project grew from the group’s discussions about mortality, technology and environmental degradation, a conversation which has become all the more poignant as one of the collaborators has since passed away.

If you are interested in ordering a copy of …and then there were none please email Rim Books.

Judges comments: The four photographers’ work is brought together seamlessly and without individual citations. …and then there were none is an incredibly well executed book that straddles a line between poetic and reportage. Jones’ texts demand that the images be read anew, creating extra, often violent, associations. It is fitting that this book grew out of a series of conversations as it is bound to trigger many more.

Mooning the Sun
Photographer: Sage Rossie
Publisher: self published and hand-bound
Printer: Wakefields Digital
Title Design: Zoe Hannay
Text: Kat Lang

Shot in an Aro Valley flat over the course of two years, Mooning the Sun is a love-letter to Rossie’s first home away from home. This is an intimate expression of queer experience that celebrates the lives of a chosen family of young artists as they come into themselves and the world.

Judges comments: Mooning the Sun is a raw and intimate collection of photographs that invites readers into the private lives of Rossie’s friends and family in the style of Nan Goldin. The photography is bold and captivating and the ordering of the book establishes a strong narrative of the place and the people. This submission really comes into its own.

Screams Like Home
Photographer: Thomas Lord
Publisher: self-published
Text: Rachel Allan

Screams Like Home is a visual journey through Japan, where Lord once lived. The work, which is formed by two parts which begin at either cover and meet with text in the middle, traces Lord’s movements through a landscape of smells, textures, and encounters in an attempt to reconnect to a place that is no longer home.

Judges comments: Screams Like Home leads the reader in from different directions with its clever reverse design, a detail that is appropriate to the subject matter and nods at different book design in different cultures. The beauty of the photographs is given pride of place and is supported by sumptuous paper stock.

YesterdayHome
Photographer: Lily Dowd
Publisher: Self Published
Designer: Lily Dowd
Text: Lily Dowd
Printer: Wakefields Digital

YesterdayHome documents Dowd’s encounters with childhood homes, and raises questions about the physical and emotional experiences of revisiting locations one has lived, especially during times of upheaval. At each site, Dowd made contact prints from materials outside the houses, exposing photographic paper beneath bushes and fences to create overlays that look remarkably like the marbled laminex synonymous with New Zealand suburbia of a certain era.

Judges comments: YesterdayHome brings together layers of associations, concept and processes through the overlays of contact prints. This is a gentle, reflective exercise and extremely personal. The photographs are strong and the quality of the printing and binding support the work beautifully.

The finalists will be displayed at the Photobook/NZ festival in Wellington in August 2022, at the Auckland Festival of Photography and the Australian Photobook of the Year Awards in Melbourne.

Judge’s comments on the 10 finalists

Athol McCredie:

“‘What makes a really good photobook?’ The answer, in the end, was that all components of the book have to work together to support the intention of the book. There are the obvious questions of quality of the photographs, their sequencing, page placement and scale. But the title, typography, cover design and material, book format, paper stock, print quality, relationship of text and image, and many other details that most of us never think much about, all need to be taken into account. In the best books everything converges to support a clear vision and product you love so much that you want to own a copy yourself.”

Claire Mabey:

"I was looking for books that asked me to keep reading; that created the space for me to take time over the images as well as comprehend the whole. I was delighted that the finalists were so varied and that each waved a different kind of accomplishment before us: humour, savvy, total aesthetic satisfaction, textural weight and heft, a weaving together of word, image with a design that served both."

Neil Pardington:

“As someone who is both a photographer and a book designer I was looking for entries that displayed excellence in both disciplines. Knowing how to work in a book design app is not the same as knowing how to design a book. The book format, layout grid, binding, materials, printing techniques and in particular typography are all areas where a designer will be invaluable to your project's success. If employing a designer is beyond your means, find someone who can act as a mentor to help guide you through these unfamiliar areas.”

See who the Aotearoa Photobook judges are: Photobook Awards judges