Winners of 14th Appalachian Mountain Photography Competition Announced During Banff Weekend

By Jesse Wood

The winners of the 14th annual Appalachian Mountain Photography Competition were announced during the Banff Mountain Film Festival World Tour stop in Boone over the weekend.

Of the 900 submissions, nearly 50 were finalists. Of those, these are the winners and special jury mention:

• Our Ecological Footprint Winner “Top Burden Valley Fill” by Lynn Willis
• Blue Ridge Parkway A Place to Play Winner “Summer Days” by Ryan Davis
• Culture Winner “Granny’s Got a Gun” by Candice Corbin
• Adventure Winner “Boardwalk in the Fog” by Lynn Willis
• Flora/Fauna Winner “Eternal Beauty” by Ronald Kevin Combs
• Landscape Winner “An Entrance to Winter” by Robert Stephens
• Best in Show “South Mountain Fire” by Cathy Anderson
• People Choice “An Entrance to Winter” by Robert Stephens
• Special Jury Mention “Taxidermy” by Candice Corbin
• Special Jury Mention “Gone Huntin’” by Candice Corbin
• Special Jury Mention “Cherokee” by Byron

Jurists were Andrew Caldwell, a professor of commercial photography, as well as a practicing commercial and contemporary fine art photographer, and Ann Pegelow Kaplan, a professor in the Department of Cultural, Gender, and Global Studies, and a faculty affiliate of the Department of Art and Interdisciplinary Studies.

Presented by ASU Outdoor Programs, the Turchin Center for the Visual Arts, and Virtual Blue Ridge and sponsored by Mast General Store, the 14th annual Appalachian Mountain Photography Competition receives support from Appalachian Voices, Blue Ridge Parkway Foundation, Footsloggers, Nikon, Bistro Roca, Peabody’s, and Stick Boy Bread. 

The winners were announced at the competition’s reception in the Turchin Center for the Visual Arts as part of Banff Film Festival Weekend in Boone. At the reception, Rich Campbell, organizer of the local Banff festival, said that the AMPC is one of the premiere photo competitions in the Southeast.

While the film festival showcases outdoor communities across the world, Campbell said that the AMPC was created to highlight the High Country and greater Appalachia and “to give everyone in our community a direct tangible link of what’s so special about the southern Appalachians.”

The “Appalachian Mountain Photography Competition” exhibition will be housed in the Mezzanine Gallery from March 3 to June 3, 2017.