The winners and finalists of the 2025 Head On Portrait Prize have been announced as this year's Head On festival launches at Sydney's Bondi Pavilion Gallery. The prestigious photography competition highlights both Australian and international photographers as part of the broader festival celebration.
Since its inception in 2010, the Head On festival has established itself as a premier showcase for contemporary photography. This year's festival runs until November 30 and features outdoor displays throughout Paddington Reservoir Gardens and along the iconic Bondi Beach, making photography accessible to both art enthusiasts and casual beachgoers.
The winning portrait, titled "The World Burns Gently," was captured by photographer Lívia Peres. The powerful image shows a child continuing to play while surrounded by smoke and fire, creating a haunting juxtaposition between childhood innocence and environmental crisis. Peres described the moment: "He kept playing while the air thickened. I stayed quiet, watching him framed between bushes and smoke. It wasn't the fire that moved me, it was his stillness inside it. I took the picture without thinking too much. Only later did I realize how often childhood continues, even when the sky shifts."
The international runner-up prize went to Natascha Tahabsem for "Witness, Gaza," a deeply moving portrait of a child evacuated from Gaza for cancer treatment. The image captures the boy just past the Jordanian checkpoint, silent and in shock after spending more than seven hours on the road. Tahabsem explained: "The bombing had already taken what should have been his hospital. Journalists and medics crowded the crossing. His face didn't change. I made this image in the brief moment before he was moved to the helicopter. No one told me his name."
Chrystal de Louise earned the Australian runner-up position with "Soft Return," a powerful self-portrait showing her holding both her newborn baby and her camera simultaneously. The postpartum image serves as what de Louise calls "a feminist act – centering the maternal gaze, rejecting flattening narratives, and honoring the unseen labor of care." She describes it as "a visual meditation on embodied philosophy" that asks what it means to come home to oneself while mothering another.
Among the notable finalists is Hilary Wardhaugh's portrait "Zev and Nick," which documents a modern relationship between Zev, who is queer and began medically transitioning seven months into their eight-year relationship, and Nick, who also maintains a three-year relationship with his girlfriend. The photograph explores contemporary definitions of love, partnership, and identity.
Other compelling entries include Yannis Kontos's "Life as an Amputee," showing seven-year-old Abu buttoning his father's collar in their shelter at an amputee camp in Sierra Leone. Abu Bakarr Kargbo, 31, was among thousands affected by the Revolutionary United Front's atrocities during Sierra Leone's civil war from 1991 to 2002.
Aletheia Casey's "My Mother and My Son" presents an intimate family moment with deep emotional resonance. Casey explained: "Before my mother died, she told me she was waiting for a bird. She said that she didn't know what type of bird this was, but that it would carry her safely away. I never found out whether her bird came for her, but I like to imagine that it did, and that it cradled her soul just as gentle as she cradled my son in this image."
The exhibition also features international perspectives, including Bienyl Huelgas's "Transpinay in Front of a Funeral Wreath," which opens a photo series exploring queer existence in the Philippines. Matthew Newton's "The Giants" shows environmentalist Bob Brown standing on the stump of a Eucalyptus regnans in Tasmania's southern forests, raising questions about conservation in modern Australia.
The diverse collection of portraits demonstrates photography's power to capture human resilience, identity, love, and loss across cultures and circumstances. The outdoor displays throughout Sydney's Paddington and Bondi areas make this year's festival particularly accessible, bringing world-class portrait photography directly to the public in both traditional gallery spaces and unexpected outdoor venues.
