Photography / Canberra Contemporary Photographic Prize 2024, at Huw Davies Gallery until June 29. Reviewed by CON BOEKEL.

“Contemporary” may here be taken as “no holds barred”. The 50 finalists here have pinned their ears back.

There is an exuberant smorgasbord of abstraction, realism, posed images, al fresco images, accidental captures, co-creation with soil fungi, constructed subjects, 3D constructions, photo-shopping, allusions to art traditions, black and white, colour, materials, textures, printing methods, blurring, erasing, sharpening, emulsion manipulation and capture methods.

Themes include disability, notions of “seeing”, gender, chance, identity, connection, disconnection, environmental issues, and indigenous issues.

As a reviewer, I approach group or competition exhibitions with a mixture of hope and dread. It is simply impossible to do justice to all 50 exhibitors. It is also generally impossible to make much integrated sense of such exhibitions.

Then there is the earnest but lively debate about how or even why we should consider “merit” at all when it comes to competitions between artists. This was taken to the extreme in a recent competition where the winner was selected at random.

Who am I to judge? Perhaps more to the point, who judges the judges?

In the event, hearty congratulations to Caleb Arcifa for Sonant Autograph of Jioni (If I Ain’t Got You), 2023, for first prize and Lisa Jayne Cramer She Carries His Grief (self portrait), 2024, for second prize. The People’s Choice Award voting remains open.

I made three choices for this review, not necessarily because they are “winners” but for other reasons.

Walking the Dog in the Cork Forest by Brenda Runnegar is set in Canberra’s Cork Oak Forest. I know it well. Walter Burley Griffin sent the acorns to Charles Weston who planted the forest in 1917. It is a dead-end forestry experiment, a successful urban recreation site, and an Iberian dreamscape. Runnegar’s artful composition creates its own layers of meanings wonderfully well.

My second choice is Claire Manning’s Is this a Portrait? 2024. It features a braille subtext and continues Manning’s excellent exploration of sight impairment and ways of seeing. I closed my eyes and ran my fingers over the braille subtext. And considered my temporary condition.

My third choice is Sherry Sheng’s Chun-Yin Rainbow Chan, 2023. It is a superb example of a large format hand-printed colour print. The Kodak paper, no longer manufactured, adds to the elegant style. There is so very much to admire here. The fabric in the image almost begs to be touched – just to see if it is real.

This exhibition is exhilarating. It is infused with humanity, laced with creativity and fixed by some extremely high levels of technical accomplishment. I heartily recommend a visit.