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Powerful Photo Awards Celebrates Image-Makers Around the World

Spotlight
Matt Growcoot
A person wearing a blue burqa and black gloves holds a small, blue, cone-shaped birdcage containing a bird against a floral wall.
In Afghanistan, a woman in a blue burqa gently holds a cage with a dove inside. Runner-up in the Exposure category. © Mauro De Bettio, courtesy of Head On Photo Festival.

A portrait of a First Nations Elder, a burning gas crater in the Turkmenistan desert, and an image exploring the environmental impact of plastic have taken out the top honors at the 2026 Head On Photo Awards, announced as the Head On Photo Festival opens in Sydney, Australia.

Australian photographers Sylvia Liber and Fernanda Pedroso, alongside Germany-based photographer Liz Miller Kovacs, have been named winners of the Portrait, Exposure and Landscape Awards respectively.

A person with long gray hair and a patterned fabric draped over their chest stands against a black background.
Aunty Lorraine, a proud Yuin/Gunai Kurnai Elder and senior Coomaditchie artist, stands with the strength of a woman who has lived through loss and continues to guide her community with wisdom. The absence of her breast is part of her journey – carried with dignity, resilience, and the quiet authority of an elder. Winner of the Portrait category. © Sylvia Liber, courtesy of Head On Photo Festival.

Taking out the Portrait Award is Queensland photographer Sylvia Liber, whose striking image, The strength she stands in, captures Aunty Lorraine, a proud Yuin/Gunai Kurnai Elder and senior Coomaditchie artist. Standing with quiet confidence, the visible absence of a breast forms part of a powerful portrait celebrating her resilience, dignity and continuing role as an Elder within her community.

A woman with long red hair wearing a floor-length cream gown stands in the center of a house destroyed by fire.
Jennifer May Nickel stands within the ruins of her home in Altadena, an unincorporated community of Los Angeles. She is a costume designer, and she chose to wear her wedding dress that she made herself for the portrait. As she was about to leave her house to flee, the wedding dress was the last thing she picked up to save from the encroaching flames. Runner-up in the Portrait category. © Gideon Mendel, courtesy of Head On Photo Festival.
An older man in a purple shirt stands next to an older woman sitting in a wooden chair in a living room with two sofas and a patterned rug.
Giramondo Publishing Company founders Ivor Indyk and Evelyn Juers photographed at home. Runner-up in the Portrait category. © Joy Mei En Lai, courtesy of Head On Photo Festival.

The Landscape Award has gone to Germany-based photographer Liz Miller Kovacs for Gates of hell, capturing Turkmenistan’s Darvaza Gas Crater, a vast pit of fire burning for more than 50 years. Kovacs travelled hundreds of kilometres through the Karakum Desert to photograph the extraordinary site.

A large, circular crater with flames burning inside sits in a desert landscape, with a small cluster of white tents and vehicles in the distance.
The Darvaza Gas Crater in Turkmenistan, one of the world’s most reclusive nations. After years of planning, I traveled hundreds of kilometres by 4WD through the Karakum Desert to the site known as the Gates of Hell. Drilled by Soviet engineers in 1971 as a natural gas well, it collapsed, and the crater was set alight to prevent poisonous gases from escaping. 50 years on it still burns. Winner of the Landscapes category. © Liz Miller Kovacs, courtesy of Head On Photo Festival.
A high-angle, black-and-white view of many small, narrow wooden boats scattered across a shallow, wide river with exposed sandbars.
Hundreds of wooden boats scatter across Bangladesh’s Jadukata River as workers collect stones from the riverbed to support thousands of families. Photographed from a nearby mountain, the scene reveals the vast scale of this demanding labour. Runner-up in the Landscapes category. © Azim Khan Ronnie, courtesy of Head On Photo Festival.
Three scuba divers explore a vast underwater landscape filled with large, textured, fan-shaped coral formations.
Constructed through photographic processes, this image reinterprets fluid material interactions as a submerged landscape. Translucent, reef-like forms emerge in layered structures, illuminated by filtered light that dissolves clear boundaries between surface and depth. Small human figures introduce scale without anchoring the scene, suggesting a tentative navigation through an environment in flux. Runner-up in the Landscapes category. © Sonja de Sterke, courtesy of Head On Photo Festival.

Canberra-based photographer Fernanda Pedroso has won the Exposure Award for Plastic metamorphosis: wings of our consumption, transforming plastic into what appears to be a delicate wing. Created using long exposure and flash photography, the image explores the contrast between beauty and pollution.

A black and white close-up of an orangutan's face peering through dense, out-of-focus tree branches and leaves.
Shot of a Bornean orangutan in Borneo, Malaysia. His species listed as Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List. Many orangutans lose their families when their homes are destroyed, and young ones are often taken to be sold as pets. Runner-up in the Exposure category. © Gianluca Carretta, courtesy of Head On Photo Festival.

Head On Photo Festival Founder and Creative Director Moshe Rosenzveig OAM says the winning images demonstrate the diversity of photography being produced around the world.

“These are three very different photographs, but each has the ability to make us stop and look. They tell stories about people, places and the world around us, and show just how much can be communicated through a single image,” Rosenzveig says.

“The Awards are an important part of Head On. They give photographers from around the world an opportunity to have their work seen by new audiences, and we’re delighted to be showcasing this year’s winners and finalists as part of the Festival.”

The Awards form part of Head On Photo Festival 2026, which brings together more than 700 photographers from over 30 countries for 93 free exhibitions across Sydney and Australia.

Running from 6–29 November, the Festival features work by some of the world’s leading photographers, exploring stories of conflict, migration, identity, Australian life and more, alongside a program of artist talks, panels and workshops.

Head On Photo Festival runs 6–29 November 2026, with exhibitions free to the public.

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