2018 Walkley Mid-Year Awards winners announced
July 24, 2018
The Walkley Foundation named its Young Australian Journalist of the Year, two new Arts Journalism Awards, a Women’s Leadership in Media Award and the Jacoby-Walkley Scholarship at its mid-year awards in Sydney on 18 August.
The Copyright Agency’s Cultural Fund supported the Arts Journalism Award and the Walkley-Pascall Award for Arts Criticism, providing $5,000 to each of the recipients. Gabriella Coslovich was awarded the Arts Journalism Award for her coverage of the alleged art fraud involving three paintings in the style of Australian artist, Brett Whiteley, while author Delia Falconer received the Walkley-Pascall Award for Arts Criticism for her article “The opposite of glamour” which appeared in the Sydney Review of Books.
SBS journalist Laura Murphy-Oates was unanimously named as winner of the 2018 Young Australian Journalist of the Year. The Walkley Advisory Board, represented by Angelos Frangopoulos, Lenore Taylor, Simon Crerar and Claire Harvey said, “Laura’s body of work was outstanding, we couldn’t look away. The fact that she was a winner in two categories also speaks to the high quality of her work, the depth of her reporting, her ability to draw insights from interviewees, and her skill in crafting a narrative that engaged viewers.”
These awards are peer-judged and selected for journalistic excellence.
The complete list of awardees is:
Walkley Young Australian Journalist of the Year
Laura Murphy-Oates: The Feed, SBS Viceland and Dateline, SBS TV
- “Young and black”
- “Kids of Kalgoorlie”
- “Vanished: Canada’s missing women”
Shortform Journalism
Cassie Zervos: Herald Sun
- “Investigation into illegal solariums”
Longform Feature or Special
Laura Murphy-Oates: The Feed, SBS Viceland
- “Kids of Kalgoorlie”
Coverage of Community and Regional Affairs
Samara Gardner: WIN News Illawarra and WIN News Canberra
- “The Tathra inferno”
Visual Storytelling
Emily Verdouw: The Feed, SBS Viceland
- “Dangerous games?”
Public Service Journalism
Laura Murphy-Oates: The Feed, SBS Viceland and Dateline, SBS TV
- “Young and black”
- “Kids of Kalgoorlie”
- “Vanished: Canada’s missing women”
Student Journalist of the Year
Christiane Barro: Monash University and The New Daily
- “The cannabis oil ‘healers’ preying on Australia’s sick and dying”
- “Contaminants detected in unlicensed cannabis oil products”
- “‘It’s a disgrace’: Senator requests complete overhaul of medicinal cannabis regulator”
Helen O’Flynn & Alan Knight Award for Best Industrial Reporting
Emma Field and Vanessa Marsh: The Weekly Times, The Courier-Mail, Townsville Bulletin, Bundaberg NewsMail and The Rural Weekly
- “Pacific worker program death count”
Women’s Leadership in Media Award
Jane Caro: The Saturday Paper, ABC News online and University of Queensland Press
- “Women’s Entrappings of High Office”
- “Women over 50 are living out two fates that show feminism is an incomplete project”
- “Unbreakable: Women share stories of resilience and hope”
Freelance Journalist of the Year
Karishma Vyas: Al Jazeera English
- “Bride and brothels: The Rohingya Trade”
- “Afghanistan: Asylum denied”
- “Forced back to Cambodia”
Arts Journalism Award
Gabriella Coslovich: Melbourne University Press
- “Whiteley on Trial”
Walkley-Pascall Award for Arts Criticism
Delia Falconer: The Sydney Review of Books
- “The opposite of glamour”
Jacoby-Walkley Scholarship
Benjamin Ansell: The University of Melbourne
Amber Schultz: Monash University
Winner of the Walkley-Pascall Award for Arts Criticism – Delia Falconer: “The Opposite of Glamour”, The Sydney Review of Books. Photo: Courtesy of the Walkley Foundation
Winner of the Arts Journalism Award – Gabriella Coslovich: “Whiteley on Trial”, Melbourne University Press. Photo: Courtesy of the Walkley Foundation.