2019 Head On Photo Festival Headliners Announced

Sukita David Bowie 1977Head On Photo Festival, Australia’s leading annual photography event, today announced 12 international award-winning photographers that will headline the 2019 Festival, presented across multiple venues in Sydney from Saturday 4 May 2019.

Celebrating its 10th anniversary in 2019, Head On will present curated exhibitions featuring contemporary fine art photography, portraiture and photojournalism by artists from Japan, Israel, Canada, Switzerland, Poland, Germany, United States of America, Korea and Australia.

Six of the curated exhibitions will be presented at the Festival Hub at Paddington Town Hall, Sydney with the remaining exhibitions being presented across Delmar Gallery, Ashfield, Lyons Gallery, Paddington and Watt Space Gallery, Newcastle.

“Head On prides itself in being a platform that presents world class exhibitions that place the work of internationally recognised artists alongside those of emerging and established Australian talent,” said Head On Festival Director Moshe Rosenzveig OAM. “2019 is set to be our most exciting year yet as we celebrate our 10th anniversary with a robust program that brings some the world’s leading photographic artists to audiences across Sydney.”

“Over the past decade, Head On has presented the work of over 5000 photographers including Roger Ballen, Mary Ellen Mark, and Bill Henson. Last year, the two-week Festival attracted record attendances and showcased 147 exhibitions and more than 1000 artists at 98 Sydney venues and galleries,” added Rosenzveig.

2019 Head On Photo Festival Curated Exhibitions and Artists include:

  • An exhibition of works by internationally celebrated and widely collected German-Australian fashion photographer Helmut Newton (1920-2004) who revolutionised how women were displayed in advertising with his provocative and erotically charged black-and-white photos that were a mainstay of Vogue and leading fashion publications.
  • David Bowie by renowned Japanese artist Masayoshi Sukita – who photographed David Bowie and numerous iconic musicians for more than 40 years, features a series of iconic portraits of David Bowie, Iggy Pop and more.
  • Ladies In Waiting by Israeli photographer Roni Ben Ari is part of a large prize winning photography project documenting the intimate lives of prostitutes across Israel, India, the Netherlands and Russia, shedding light on those individual we would rather not see: the rejected, the invisible and the voiceless.
  • The American Boys project by American artist Soraya Zaman is a bold and intuitive representation of USA’s trans-masculine community and shines a light on what it is to be trans in American society today through a series of intimate portraits of trans men at distinct stages of their transition.
  • Exodus: Rohingya Refugee Crisis by Australian Walkley Award winning photojournalist David Dare Parker explores the stories of refugees crossing the Myanmar border in 2017.
  • 9 Gates of No Return by Polish photojournalist Agata Grzybowska is a series about loneliness that studies the lives of the outcasts, fugitives and exiles who dropped out of society after World War Two to live in the mountains of Bieszczady.
  • Gods of Suburbia by award winning Canadian Pop Surrealist photographer Dina Goldstein analyses religious faith within the context of the modern forces of technology, science and secularism by placing iconic religious images and characters on a modern day context.
  • Under Twenty Seven by award-winning Australian photographic artist Ella Dreyfus is the third installment of the an iconic monochrome series of photographic portraits documenting the artist’s son and his friends every seven years, observing them as they evolve from childhood into early adulthood.
  • not beautiful but beautiful by Korean photographic artist Giljung Yoon explores the sexuality of disabled and physically challenged people through a series of portraits.
  • Fur Mich / A Way of Reconciliation by German photojournalist Sina Niemeyer, which was published as a book in 2018 and presented at a number of international photography festivals, combines photography, writing, graphic design and found objects to create an autobiographical story of the sexual abuse Niemeyer experienced as a child.
  • A self-portrait through the eyes of my lovers by award-winning Swiss photographic artist Jenny Rova explores how we look at people we love by presenting fifty-five photos taken by the artist’s nine partners over a twenty-five year period. The series depicts both a biographical work of the artist but also an indirect portrait of the photographer, the partner behind the lens.
  • Sapeurs Portraits Series by UK based 2018 “Photographer of the Year” Tariq Zaidi documents the La Sape fashion subculture in cities of Kinshasa, DRC and Brazzaville (Republic of the Congo) where everyday citizens transform themselves into debonair dandies and sashay through the streets where they are treated like rock stars as they bring exuberant joy to their communities and defy their circumstances.

All curated exhibitions will be supported by a program of free artist talks as well as ticketed discussion panels as part of the Festival’s greater program.

The Head On Photo Awards return in 2019 – offering a prize-pool of $60,000 – judged by internationally renowned photographers, picture editors and curators. The Awards represent a global selection of the best work from emerging and established photographers across four categories including Portrait, Landscape and Mobile, which are open internationally to professional and amateur photographers from classical and contemporary styles.

The Head On Student Award is open to school years K-12. All finalists are exhibited in an exhibition during the Festival. Call for 2019 entries has now closed. Further programming for the 2019 Head On Photo Festival will be announced in coming months. For more information, visit: www.headon.com.au for details.

Image: Masayoshi Sukita stands in front of the picture he took of David Bowie in 1977. The shot was used as the cover art for Bowie’s Heroes album / © 2018 Sukita Partners