X-ray image wins 2022 Bowness Photography Prize

9 October 2022

Melbourne artist Amos Gebhardt has won the 2022 Bowness Photography Prize, with the artist taking home $30,000 for their winning work ‘Wallaby’ (2022).

Amos Gebhardt, Wallaby 2022. courtesy of the artist and Tolarno Galleries (Melbourne).

In the work, Gebhardt has integrated x-ray and satellite imaging to explore themes of trauma and sentience. The win is Gebhardt's first in the competition, after being a finalist on four separate ocassions in the last five years. Wallaby 2022 will also be acquired into MGA’s significant collection of Australian photographs.

Anouska Phizacklea, MGA Director, described the work as sitting at the boundaries of photography while tapping into its inner core – refractions of light.

"In one image the artist focuses on the untimely death of an individual creature and yet locates its significance within the cosmos. It asks us to consider life and death and the nature of sentient beings," she said.

Over the last 16 years, the William and Winifred Bowness Photography Prize has emerged as an important annual survey of contemporary photographic practice in Australia and one of the most prestigious prizes in the country.

In addition, and from a shortlist of 54 works that form the 2022 edition of the Bowness Prize, three Honourable mentions were also awarded - the first, to Petrina Hicks for her arresting and provocative exploration of motherhood in Hercules (2021).

Petrina Hicks, Hercules 2021. Courtesy of the artist, Michael Reid, (Sydney) and THIS IS NO FANTASY (Melbourne).

The second was awarded to Danie Mellor for the 'haunting and moving' large-scale work The far country (2022), that incorporates archival and recent infra-red imagery to address the rich cultural traditions connected with Country and the history of photographic images that helped to shape the development of Australian colonial and settler identity.

Danie Mellor, The far country 2022. Courtesy of the artist and Tolarno Galleries (Melbourne).

And finally, Sonia Payes, for her work Exoplanet 1 (2022), described as an 'otherworldly evocation' of volcanic forces that explode and rip into the earth’s core.

Sonia Payes, Exoplanet 1, 2022. Courtesy of the artist and Scott Livesey Gallery (Melbourne).

In addition, voting for the Smith & Singer People’s Choice Award is open until the last day of the exhibition, Sunday 13 November 2022, with the recipient receiving $5,000.. You can find out more about the 2022 Bowness Photography Prize here.