Head On Photo Festival announced the winners of the 2019 Head On Photo Awards. Judged anonymously by internationally renowned photographers, picture editors and curators, the annual Awards celebrate excellence in four categories including Portrait, Landscape, Mobile and Student. Exhibitions featuring the 130 finalist and winning works for each category will be presented as part of the 2019 Head On Photo Festival at Juniper Hall, The Paddington Reservoir Gardens, NSW Parliament House and The Festival Hub at Paddington Town Hall from 4 – 19 May 2019.

The annual Awards offer a prize-pool of $60,000 to professional and amateur photographers around the world and are a rewarding platform for all levels with finalist exhibitions set to tour internationally after the Festival.

First prize winners of the 2019 Head On Photo Awards are:

Portrait Prize: Unlucky by Australian photographer Juliet Taylor depicts Sheryl sitting in her taxi outside Pappy & Harriet’s bar, waiting for her husband to finish drinking so she can take him home. The image was taken in Pioneertown, which sits in the basin of the San Bernardino High Desert, where it is so black at night you can barely see a foot in front of you.

Landscape Prize: Australian photographer Bruce Haswell’s Blackpool, UK, captures Blackpool beach.

Mobile Prize: Fruit Crush by Australian photographer Mel Meek captures her niece on the beach after a day of swimming. Unlike their typical family photos the image allowed Meek to see, for the first time, her niece not as a child but as becoming a grown up.

Student Prize: Australian photographer Aimee Sluga’s LAST GOODBYE captures the sadness of the final moments before her grandmother’s passing. Brought into hospital with severe pressure sores, dementia, pneumonia and weighing only 45 kg, her grandmother was completely reliant on nurses and no longer knew who Sluga was.

Image: Juliet Taylor, Unlucky. Courtesy Head On Photo Festival