The fun and fast-paced Off to Work Event Photography Awards ceremony made a successful and highly enjoyable return to the plush Mayfair townhouse venue No.4 Hamilton Place on Tuesday 4th October after a virtual event in 2020 and pandemic-enforced pause in 2021.
The not-for-profit competition was open to images captured during both 2020 and 2021 and featured two new categories: Portraits, which was won by a shot of the (now) King Charles III, and the special one-off Covid Chronicles, which attracting many moving entries that brought back mournful memories of masks and social distancing…
As ever though, there was a plethora of pleasing, insightful and inspiring images amongst more than 100 short-listed shots that were on display at the awards event, which featured delicious canapes and bowl food by caterers Blue Strawberry and slick production by Visions.
The prestigious Overall Winner trophy and a cheque for £1,000 was picked up by Luke Dyson, whose panoramic shot of Reading Festival was a clear winner having gladdened the hearts of the judges. Entitled ‘Cherry Picking Season’, the image was captured while Luke was lofted 65ft above ground by a cherry-picker lorry, hence the title.
Runner-up was the atmospheric winner of the Music category ‘Pianoman’, taken by Carlos-Alvar Gonzalez, who flew in from Mexico to collect his trophies. The two top Highly-Commended accolades went to regular Catering category winner, Deb Porter, for her cleverly captured ‘Reflected Chef’, and Jack Boskett for ‘Horsepower’, which encapsulated an Experiential Event that was three years in the planning. For the first time ever there was also a dead hear – in the Weddings category, which was shared by Steve Rooney and Andy Griffiths.
Competition founder, Philip Atkins, MD of staffing agency Off to Work commented: “Photography does so much to amplify, justify and sustain the events industry, so we felt it was important not to wait until 2023 to relaunch the competition, especially as we could include some amazing images taken during the Covid crisis. The competition was as tough as ever and the images entered captured both the resilience and brilliance of the events sector.”
Competition director, Graham Hill, commented: “We owe huge debts of gratitude to our sponsors and event partners for making the competition and awards event such a success. To our array of industry leading judges as well, who had over 300 photos to review. The competition has been a great success and will run again in 2023, with entries opening in November as the awards event will return to its traditional schedule and culminate in May.”
