Calling all artists and photographers! It’s the return of one of our most popular open calls, the Booooooom Art & Photo Book Award! Once again we are teaming up with our friends over at Artmobile to offer the chance to have your work published as a standalone book for free! We will be selecting 6 projects to turn into books—each by a different artist, illustrator, or photographer—at zero cost to the individual.
If you have a specific series or a cohesive selection of work that you want to turn into a book, we want to see it. We are looking for finished work as opposed to works-in-progress or otherwise incomplete projects. This is open to all our members, if you’re not a member you can learn more about becoming one here.
These beautiful books seen above were created by last year’s winners: Sheida Sherkarian, Lindsay Ellary, Lawrence Agyei, Tom DesLongchamp, and Francisco Gonzalez Camacho.
Artmobile is an independent online bookstore where creators, authors and publishers can reach their audiences more easily and cost-effectively than anywhere else. An extension of Bookmobile (the ones who printed our Small Victories book), Artmobile allows you to sell online without the hassle of obtaining an ISBN, figuring out shopping cart software, or creating an Amazon seller account. A full-service selling engine, Artmobile also stores your books and handles every aspect of fulfillment. You focus on creating art. Artmobile helps you sell it. If you want to learn more about Artmobile, you can check out their website here, or email them directly here. Go browse their titles and support other creators!
We know it’s a dream for many of you to publish a book of your own work and this is a chance to do it without all the costs. These will be your books, not ours, so each of you will have full control of the design and layout. We will happily provide assistance/guidance if you need it, but the book design will ultimately be your responsibility.
Once the books are printed, you can choose to sell them on your own website or on Artmobile, or give them all away to your friends and family—it’s up to you!
Book Details:
- 100 copies
- up to a 10″ x 10″ trim size
- up to 100 pages
- paperback print run
- color interior
- two rounds of print proofs/corrections
This is what is being offered for FREE. You may decide to upgrade aspects of your book (more copies, more pages, bigger dimensions, hardcover etc) and you would just pay the difference.
Important Stuff:
- We are looking for a cohesive selection of finished work that you want to turn into a book (as opposed to works-in-progress or otherwise incomplete projects).
- You must submit 10 images of your work and describe the focus of your book. You may submit as many times as you like however one thoughtful submission is better than three half-baked ones. Quality over quantity!
- Multiple submissions only makes sense if you have separate book ideas (maybe one is a book of portraits and the other is a collection of street photography). Please do not make multiple submissions for the same book idea.
- Maximum size to upload: 2500 x 2500 px (images do not need to be square, these are simply the max height and width so we aren’t opening thousands of massive files).
- Format for naming your files: FIRSTNAME_LASTNAME_01.JPG
- Everyone will be notified whether they are selected or not via email. It generally takes our team a minimum of 8 weeks to go through all the submissions (varies depending on the amount), please be patient.
Use the button below to submit.
*Log in to enable the submit button. This form is just for members, you can learn about becoming a member here.
Deadline for submissions: 11:59PM PST May 26, 2023
Here’s a little more detailed look at last year’s winners: Sheida Sherkarian, Lindsay Ellary, Lawrence Agyei, Tom DesLongchamp, and Francisco Gonzalez Camacho. Some chose to upgrade different details and each took a wildly different direction aesthetically. Take a look at them all below!
A Few Views is an exploration of shared experiences from the mind of artist Sheida Shekarian. Love the decision she made to include isolated sections of her work alongside the full images as each is packed with so many playful details.
Lindsay Ellary’s Chin Up Baby, Smile is a striking collection of portraits offering an intimate perspective of female youth. Ellary says, “The disconnect between the easy innocence of the subjects and the calculated tone of the imagery is intentional”.
In Drill, Lawrence Agyei pays tribute to South Shore Drill Team, a performance arts band based in Chicago’s south side that empowers marginalized youth. “The rituals that bind them in drill are stronger than the social pressures that would divide them on the streets in a city with a history of violence and crime”.
Nowhere to Now spans the eight years Tom DesLongchamp has spent developing his unique fingerprint/ink printmaking process. It’s beautiful to see the evolution of DesLongchamp’s mark-making through each portrait.
Francisco Gonzalez Camacho produced the spectacular images for Elsewhere using a digital camera modified for infrared photography. Camacho describes his photography as “an instrument through which I can reveal not only the nature that encloses me, but the nature that reflects the landscape within”.
*Log in to enable the submit button. This form is just for members, you can learn about becoming a member here.
Deadline for submissions: 11:59PM PST May 26, 2023
Once again, thank you to Artmobile for making this possible, we’re looking forward to seeing what you got!
If you are unable to afford a membership, we are offering a one-time submission for photographers who are experiencing financial hardship. Head over here to apply. (Available until May 19th, 2023)
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