14. 10. 2025–30. 10. 2025 Maribor Photobook Award 2025
Maribor Photobook Award 2025
great hall, Maribor Art Gallery, Strossmayerjeva 6
14–30 October 2025
award ceremony, exhibition opening and artist talks: Tuesday, 14 October 2025, 17:00
The Maribor Photobook Award 2025 is a biennial award and exhibition of photobooks, now in its fifth year. The award aims to showcase the latest global photobook production to the public, while also rewarding books that most effectively visualise the set theme and excel in terms of production quality. Organised by the Maribor-based publishing house The Angry Bat in DEZ – Društvo za evropsko zavest, the award and exhibition aim to address important social issues through contemporary photography.
This year, the award is again open to a variety of photographic voices, concepts, and approaches, with a particular focus on the theme of 'protest' and photobooks that explore different forms of social resistance and activism that are shaping our world today. Photography has always played a key role in documenting, interpreting, and highlighting these crucial historical moments, from silent resistance to collective uprisings, and from the struggle for human rights to movements for equality and justice.
The following awards will be presented at this year's Maribor Photobook Award: the Grand Prix, the Best ''Protest'' Photobook, and the prize for the Best photography book published in Southeast Europe.
The international jury: Tanja Lažetić (SI), artist; Birgit Sattlecker (AT), curator, publisher, and member of the board of the Fotohof gallery and publishing house in Salzburg; Aneta Kowalczyk and Grzegorz Kosmal (PL/AT), founders and directors of Blow Up Press.
After the announcement of the winners and the opening of the exhibition, the jury members will present their art practices and publishing activities. The presentations and discussions will be moderated by Matej Sitar, photographer, founder of The Angry Bat publishing house, and head of the Maribor Photobook Award.
Programme:
17:00 / Award Ceremony and Exhibition Opening
17:30 / Tanja Lažetić
18:00 / Birgit Sattlecker, Fotohof
18:30 / Aneta Kowalczyk and Grzegorz Kosmala, Blow Up Press
Alongside photobooks that are part of this year’s competition, a selection of photobooks by Palestinian and other authors, titled Focus: Palestine, as well as Red Box, a selection of photo and artist’s books by the artist and jury member Tanja Lažetić.
Project is funded by Municipality of Maribor.
Sponzors and Partners: Fani&Rozi, Vila Krista, Europlakat
JURY DECISIONS:
The main prize is shared between Julia Mejnertsen and JT.
Julia Mejnertsen: HUN
Dalpine/Fiebre Photobook, 2024
Julia Mejnertsen explores her mother’s relationship to hunting. The book moves us deeply because of its subject – it is difficult to connect birth and killing. The book could even begin on its last page, where, beneath the image of a breastfeeding woman, we read: “(...) Hunting has become my passion. I never get tired of it. It’s not like giving birth to my first child, but it’s similar. (...)” Throughout the book, the beautiful design creates a cinematic flow; we follow photographs, drawings, and archival images. The work feels especially relevant in a time when the news confronts us daily with war and killing.
JT, Wild Grass
La Maison de Z, 2024
Jin Tian grew up in China during the 1980s and witnessed the devastating consequences of the one-child policy. The soft, almost coverless book leads us through haunting photographs of abandoned children and both official and unofficial orphanages across China. The mostly black-and-white photographs neither condemn nor merely document. The people depicted are intensely present, while the empty black pages, through their silence, draw us into the depth of their tragic situation.
Best Book Award for books published in Southeastern Europe
Sanja Bistričić Srića: If This Is True, What Else Must Be?
Biblioteka Prozori, 2025
Sanja Bistričić Srića conceived her book as a collage of photographs and questions taken from fashion magazines, interwoven with drawings. The text, through repetition, eludes any clear answer, creating a sense of unattainable meaning. The hard, robust cover prevents an easy glance inside – even that, however, suggests another layer of meaning.
Best Book Award on the theme of Protest
Daniel Chatard, NIEMANDSLAND
The Eriskay Connection, 2024
Daniel Chatard explores the impact of brown coal extraction in Germany’s Rhineland, where the energy giant RWE operates some of the largest open-cast lignite mines in Europe – notably Hambach and Garzweiler. These mines are not only among the continent’s biggest sources of CO₂ emissions but have also drastically reshaped the landscape, swallowing fields, forests, and entire villages.
The photobook traces the history of protest since 1997, combining archival data, personal photographs, and texts to offer a deeper insight into the struggle against the ecological catastrophe of our time.
