HarperCollins Publishers Award for Best Cover 2018
Finalist
Designer: Alice Bonifant
Title: The Long Dream of Waking: New perspectives on Len Lye
Publisher: Canterbury University Press
Format: 240 x 170mm, limpbound, section sewn with flaps. Cover printed black plus PMS (Orange 021C), with matt laminate and Spot UV gloss. Inside cover printed solid PMS (Orange 021C). Cover photograph of Len Lye by Robert Del Tredici (1979).
Typography: Freight Text Pro used throughout (Book, book italic and bold). All type was removed from the front cover in order to meet Len Lye’s gaze through the magnifying glass without any distraction; emphasising the book itself — a collection of academic essays — as a lens on Lye’s practice. It was also important that the greyscale cover had a flash of orange down the spine as a nod to the energy in his work.
Judges’ Comments: Arresting and modernist. Does what it says on the tin — a film maker and visual artist cleverly shown in focus. The spot gloss varnish is a neat trick. The pop of orange set against the black and white image, the latter of which continues onto the flaps works well. Expressing that we are looking at a crop of the bigger picture. Perhaps alluding to the new views of a well-known subject?
