And/or Book Awards

Philippe Garner and Francine Stock are to chair the two judging panels for the 2010 And/or Book Awards, the UK’s leading prizes for books published in the fields of photography and the moving image (including film, television and new media).

Philippe Garner is a Director and Head of Photographs at Christie’s auction house. As chair of the panel for the Best Photography Book Award 2010, he will be joined by Tessa Traeger, the distinguished still-life and food photographer, and Charlotte Cotton, author, curator and creative director of the forthcoming London galleries of the National Media Museum.

Philippe Garner comments: “Despite predictions that it would be made redundant by the digital media, the printed book remains a vehicle without parallel for the presentation, dissemination and preservation of images and texts in contexts of scholarship or creative expression. I am delighted that the And/or Book Awards continue to support and celebrate the crucial role of book publishing in our culture.”

The judging panel for the Best Moving Image Book Award 2010 will be chaired by Francine Stock, journalist, film critic, novelist, and presenter of BBC Radio 4’s The Film Programme. She will be joined by documentary filmmaker, writer and curator Mark Cousins, and Professor John Orr, author and specialist in Film Studies and Modern Culture at Edinburgh University.

“The And/or Book Awards rightly focus attention on the scholarship and imagination of the best books about film – an art form which so powerfully mesmerizes, but also sometimes puzzles us. This is a chance to give those books, which may be the literary equivalent of cult movies, the opportunity to be appreciated by a larger audience.”

Marking their 25th anniversary year in 2010, the And/or Book Awards celebrate excellence in photography and moving image publishing. £10,000 prize money is divided between the Best Photography Book Award and the Best Moving Image Book published or distributed in the UK in 2009.

The panels will choose two shortlists (to be announced in March 2010). Winners of each award will be announced at an awards ceremony at BFI Southbank in April 2010. The judging panels will be looking for works that make a significant contribution to photographic and/or moving image scholarship, history, research, criticism, science and conservation. – ePhotozine