The New York Rights Fair has announced nine winners and 14 honorable mentions in the “Talking Pictures: Selected Books” program, which is a component of “Talking Pictures: The Visual Book Now,” a cultural initiative of the rights fair. The program chose books in five categories for excellence in book design, including cookbooks, art and photography books, architecture and graphic design, children’s picture books, and comics and graphic novels.

Working in collaboration with Steven Guarnaccia of the Parsons School of Design in New York, and the Hamelin Cultural Association of Bologna, Italy, the NYRF cited a total of 23 books, all published between January 1 and December 31, 2018, from an array of nearly 600 books submitted from around the globe. The 23 winners and honorable mentions represent publishers from eight countries: the United States, Norway, Sweden, France, Lithuania, Argentina, Portugal, and Australia.

The books will be displayed in a special gallery section of the Jacob Javits Center in New York City during BookExpo, which runs adjacent to and concurrently with the New York Rights Fair, from May 29 to 31, 2019. The 33 authors, illustrators, and photographers who plan to be in attendance will participate in design-focused programming during the fairs, among them the "Talking Pictures: The Visual Book Now" panel scheduled for Thursday, May 30, 2019, from 3:30 to 4:15 p.m. A reception for the Talking Pictures winners and honorable mentions, open to all fair-goers and exhibitors, is scheduled for May 30, 2019, from 4:15 to 5 p.m.

“We were delighted to receive nearly 600 books, from all corners of the world, and look forward to showcasing this program during the New York Rights Fair,” said Krista Rafanello, NYRF show manager. “Talking Pictures represents the essence of the fair, which is to create a meeting place for discussion about global content, to share great works and to support books traveling over borders to reach readers.”

WINNERS FOR 2018

Architecture & Graphic Design

  • Don't Sleep: The Urgent Messages of Oliver Munday by Oliver Munday (Rizzoli International)

Art & Photography

  • Civilization by William A. Ewing and Holly Roussell (Thames & Hudson)

Children's Picture Books

  • À Travers by Tom Haugomat (Éditions Thierry Magnier)
  • A Guerra by José Jorge Letria; illustrated by André Letria (Pato Lógico Edições)
  • Fabler och Andra Berättelser by Lev Tolstoj and Jockum Nordström (Rabén & Sjögren)

Comics & Graphic Novels

  • Yellow Negroes and Other Imaginary Creatures by Yvan Alagbé (New York Review of Books)
  • Vies Parallèles by Olivier Schrauwen (Actes Sud)

Cookbooks

  • River Cafe London: Thirty Years of Recipes and the Story of a Much-Loved Restaurant by Ruth Rogers, Rose Gray, Sian Wyn Owen and Joseph Trivelli (Penguin Random House)
  • Waste Not by James Beard Foundation (Rizzoli International)

HONORABLE MENTIONS FOR 2018

Architecture & Graphic Design

  • Patrick Bouchain, l'architecture comme relation by Abdelkader Damani (Actes Sud)
  • Milton Glaser: Posters by Milton Glaser (Abrams)

Art & Photography

  • Flowers for Lisa by Abelardo Morell (Abrams)
  • Flora: Inside the Secret World of Plants by DK, with contributions by Royal Botanic Gardens Kew (DK)

Children's Picture Books

  • Panthera Tigris by Sylvain Alzial; illustrated by Hélène Rajcak (Éditions du Rouergue)
  • Jouer Dehors by Laurent Moreau (Hélium Éditions)
  • Dentro de una cebra by Micaela Chirif; illustrated by Renato Moriconi (Limonero)
  • My First Book of Patterns by Bobby and June George; illustrated by Boyoun Kim (Phaidon)

Comics & Graphic Novels

  • KJØT by Mette Karlsvik; illustrated by Tord Torpe (Magikon Forlag)
  • The Goat-Getters by Eddie Campbell (Ohio State University Press)
  • All the Answers by Michael Kupperman (Simon & Schuster)

Cookbooks

  • From the Earth by Peter Gilmore; illustrations and photographs by Brett Stevens (Hardie Grant Publishing)
  • How the Future King of England Ate Peacock in Vilnius: The Shared Cultural, Political and Culinary History from Britain and Lithuania by Rimvydas Laužikas and Antanas Astrauskas (Lithuanian Culture Institute)