On Saturday 1st December the Quay Arts opened its doors to the 2nd Isle of Wight Photographer of The Year Awards (IWPOY) Ceremony.  As the evening progressed Amanda Johnson (pictured) our Editor of Island Pulse became the surprised recipient of the first ever Julia Margaret Cameron Photographic Award (JMC).

This is the first time in Dimbola history an award such as this has been presented, David White as Dimbola’s ˜photographer in residence said he hoped the Award would encourage other Island photographers and camera clubs on the Island to support the IWPOY and Dimbola to strengthen the Island’s photographic community.

The IWPOY evening was buzzing with anticipation as the short-listed photographers and invited guests mingled and chatted. 

Hosted by the Isle of Wight Digital Imaging Group (IWDIG), founding member Gary Early, gave an introduction about the competition’s aims and recognised the sponsors for their support.

The great Dimbola-Duo of Brian Hinton M.B.E and David White kept everyone enthralled with their presentation about Dimbola’s newly acquired ‘Nellie Mundy’ album and the work of Julia Margaret Cameron.  Brian kept the audience amused with his impersonation of children hiding from JMC’s camera and once again their talk was both facinating and entertaining.

David White, Dimbola’s ‘photographer in residence’ took centre stage to announce the Julia Margaret Cameron Photographic Award this is the first time in Dimbola history that an award such as this has been presented.

David explained that this is to be an annual award presented to the person who has done the most for photography on the Island over the preceeding year and that this award is not necessarily for the best photographer but will be awarded for services to the photographic community.

David further explained that he hoped the JMC Photographic Award would encourage other Island photographers and camera clubs on the Island to support the IWPOY  and Dimbola  and strengthen the Island’s photographic community.

David then presented the first Julia Margaret Cameron Photographic Award to a very surprised Amanda Johnson from the IWDIG.

The IWPOY competition was her original idea and as well as setting it up her role is to administer the competition and an online photographic forum.  A semi-professional photographer herself Amanda is also heavily involved in promoting photography as Editor through IW news website Island Pulse .

Everyone agreed that the award was well deserved and were impressed by the enthusiastic support that Dimbola has for the IWPOY and photography on the Island.

After a short break the very first IWPOY winner, Kevin Mitchell, gave a short talk on what winning the 2006 Photographer of the Year award had meant to him.  Kevin’s talk was encouraging to all Island photographers and he explained how his photography had progessed through his involvement with the IWDIG over the past year.

The photographers of the fifty short-listed images were then presented with their exhibition certificates by Alan Marriott, Editor of the Isle of Wight County Press. By this time the announcement of the top three winners was rapidly approaching and it was great to see Island MP Andrew Turner step up to present the certificates and the canvas prints to the winning photographers.

Alan Marriott presented the final award of ‘a day with an Isle of Wight County Press Photgrapher’ to the overall winner, Neil Hunt for his winning image ‘St Catherine’s Lighthouse’.

Congratulations to the winners and all photographers who made the short-list. A special thank you is also due to the IWPOY sponsors and all involved in staging the event. We are already receiving offers of increased sponsorship for 2008 and looking forward to viewing the exhibitions and seeing all of the new images for next year.

Please Note: IWPOY material is ©IWPOY and not provided for open source, anyone wishing to use any of the materials displayed, whether for public, private or commercial use must first contact IWPOY  for permission or licence of use.

Isle of Wight Community News @Island Pulse.