The LPOTY Farce
As my mate Mark would say, jings, but where to start with this mess.
UK LPOTY ‘23, as you may or may not know, I finished as the overall runner up. Quite an achievement one might say, given this is what likes to tout itself as the UK’s premier landscape competition, with tens of thousands of images and entrants each year.
If only someone had bothered to inform me, I might have got to enjoy it.
‘VEINS’ - Overall runner up in the 2023 UK LPOTY (apparently)
The first I heard was on the night of the awards by a fellow photographer in attendance. The exchange went something like: “looks like you’re runner up in LPOTY, congratulations” or to that effect. “News to me??” “I had a rejection email weeks ago, dunno what gives you that idea.” I replied. Much to the confusion of my photographer friend (congrats btw, lovely image), he sends a picture with the book on his lap open at my image. Bewilderment ensued, cue many tags in posts by other photographers and messages on social media. Phone went nuts for the evening.
Poor, very poor.
I won’t labour too long at my own woes, however it’s been a hugely disappointing episode. From a pragmatic standpoint, what should have been a significant achievement and a useful boost to my own business as a professional, is sadly dead in the water. The moment has gone, in fact it’s as if it never happened (LPOTY haven’t even bothered to share this image on any of their socials either, go figure) I can’t really use this now and frankly I don’t want to, such is my anger. I’m strongly principled, the worst thing you can do to me is show a lack of respect, and throughout this its felt like an enormous lack of respect, not just to me but entrants in general which I’ll get on to. I’ve since had contact with LPOTY, and the person I spoke to I hugely respect despite not knowing on a personal level, so if you’re reading this, it’s not aimed at you personally, but rather the general malaise that this competition has become. How one deals with mistakes in life says a lot about a person. If that was my competition, I’d have been personally doing the grovelling myself. Leadership and accountability are vital in any successful organisation, it says everything about you and your reputation. Sadly this has been non-existent, make of that what you will. I couldn’t give a monkeys who you are, respect is earned, not given.
My case isn’t an isolated incident sadly. I’ve spoken to, or know of, at least 3 others who weren’t informed of being awarded in this competition. I’ve no idea how many others that might have happened to, but you’d imagine it’s more. Please go and read the blog post from Andy Gray, a superb photographer whose stunning work was bizarrely omitted from the book itself despite receiving highly commended and commended awards??? At the time of writing no-one has bothered to reply to his emails, and to date neither of us have received our ‘complimentary’ books, 3.5 weeks after the event. His case is probably more bizarre than my own, the incompetence is frankly quite staggering. I’ll give you another example: My mate Dem won the classic view category last year. His image goes to the Sunday Times only for it to be printed with the wrong caption. An image taken in the Peak District titled from the Brecon Beacons??!! I saw the emails related to this, the whole thing was rather casually brushed off by LPOTY and The Times in a “oh these things happen” sort of manner. Unfortunately for them my mate is at the top of the tree in what he does, and like many of us works in an environment where that attitude simply doesn’t wash (it’s never acceptable). Rightly, he gave it to them both barrels and I’d have done exactly the same. The almost brusque, off-hand tone of the replies left me a bit open mouthed. You feel like saying “you realise we’re paying for this mess don’t you?” Winning the classic view category and having your image front and centre in a national broadsheet might be a once in a lifetime achievement, yet bizarrely for a competition which prides itself on being the best of the best, anger at incidents like this appears completely lost on them, and are brushed off with alarming casualness. Some of these issues might be (barely) acceptable if it was a local level camera club competition, but not the biggest landscape competition in the UK. Utterly bonkers.
Part of me wants to say “come on lad it’s only a photography comp for gods sake”, but on the other hand I think, no, there needs to be some accountability here, especially considering how much people are paying into this and how much money is being made. Talking to others, I sense many over the years who’ve been on the receiving end of this competition’s ‘foibles’ don’t wish to publicly rock the boat for fear of getting black-listed, such was its once considerable influence. Times change however, apathy and complacency appear to have taken hold, the whole thing feels rather tired and out of touch with what’s going on. A couple of easy examples: in one instance, the same image (basically) has been awarded 3 years running in the cityscapes category (or whatever former names its gone by), with the past two years taken by the same photographer! There’s numerous other instances (most famously the Chrome Hill shot in the snow, 4 out of 5 years awarded) which has become such a running joke among photographers that it should have its own special award at this point. Another is that shot from Canada Square in London, I’ve seen that at least 3 times in recent years. Basic, basic stuff. Audit past awarded images? Nah too difficult apparently. This is absolutely amateurish and if it were my competition I’d be absolutely mortified this was happening. Details matter, it looks like a complete lack of care and professionalism though I doubt anyone is even aware of these cases.
How do I conclude this? I could be here all night but needless to say I’ve probably burned a few bridges here, though I can’t in good conscience continue to support a competition which I feel lets its supporters down so badly, all the while making a rather handsome profit off their backs. You don’t have to be brain of Britain to figure the net result of diminished prizes, a smaller book, scaled back presentation against seemingly record numbers of entries. There’s much that I could have included here that I’ve left out (stories from others, more subjective issues, shockingly poor prizes funds etc.) but I think I’ve said what I need to say. I think this competition needs to have a long look at itself and ask some searching questions, though I’d not be surprised if they think anything is even wrong. A rather sad experience all round.
Stuart
