Headlines
The Folio Society Book lllustration Award 2024 Is Open For Entries
The Next Generation Of Illustrators
The Folio Society’s prestigious Book Illustration Award 2024 is open now for submissions and here’s a few details…
Illustration is at the heart of everything we do at Folio. As well as commissioning renowned illustrators and artists, we also nurture new talent and champion artists who work across a diverse range of media, from oil painting and wood engraving to collage and digital illustration.
The Folio Book Illustration Award offers the opportunity for aspiring and established illustrators to provide one piece of artwork in response to Neil Gaiman’s short story ‘The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains’.
The judges – Folio Art Directors, Sheri Gee and Raquel Leis Allion, Folio Publishing Director, Tom Walker, FBIA 2023 winner, Cristina Bencina, and Neil Gaiman – will be looking for strong characterisation and atmosphere in the entries, along with a demonstrated ability to read and reflect the text. The final piece should illustrate a character-based scene from the story, not solely a portrait of a character.
To make the competition accessible to as many artists as possible, there is no entry fee. An initial longlist selection of 20 entries will be announced in June, with the judging panel announcing the winning artist and five runners-up in July.
The winner will receive a prize of £2,000 cash, plus £500 worth of Folio vouchers, and their artwork will appear in the upcoming Folio collection of Neil Gaiman’s short stories. Each of the five runners-up will receive £500 worth of Folio vouchers. The winning artist and runners-up will also receive a portfolio review by the Folio art directors.
The competition is open to anyone over the age of 18 who has not previously been commissioned by The Folio Society.
Key information
- No entry fee
- £2,000 first prize, plus portfolio review
- Each of the five runners-up receive £500 of Folio vouchers plus portfolio review
- Winning artwork will be published in upcoming Folio anthology of Neil Gaiman short stories
- Entries only accepted via Zealous
- The competition is open to anyone over the age of 18 who has not previously been commissioned by The Folio Society
- Artwork inspired by any source other than the set text will not be accepted
- Artwork created by artificial intelligence is inadmissible
Key dates
- Competition closes 23:59 (UK time), Wednesday 3 April 2024
- Longlist announced June 2024
- Winner and runners-up announced July 2024
