FAQs National Works on Paper

Handy tips for submissions

What should I submit?

We are looking for works that highlight the importance of paper as a medium. 

We enjoy seeing works where paper is not just a background. Paper becomes the space that is intrinsic to how the work is read.

There is no size limit! We’ve exhibited works that are 5 x 5 cm’s and works that are 20 metres long. 

You can enter a diptych, a triptych, or a quadriptych. Basically your work can have many parts to it, as long as it’s all part of the same work. 

Artist statement and CV

It’s not always easy writing about your own work, but the artist statement is the best place to describe the conceptual ideas behind your work, and how you’ve made the work to realise those ideas. 

If you include a brief bio at the top of your CV, then you don’t need to introduce your practice in your artist statement. You can use the allocated word limit (150 words) to speak directly about the actual work you are submitting. Awesome!

Photographing three-dimensional artworks

We encourage artists who work across all artforms in the medium of paper to submit an entry! We know it can be a challenge to photograph a sculptural work or an artist book ‘in its entirety’. Whether you photograph the work yourself or engage a professional photographer, we encourage artists to think about how they might capture the best image of their work.

For sculptural works, attention to adequate lighting can help to convey the three-dimensionality of a work, drawing attention to shape and texture without the need for multiple images from different angles.

An artist book may be photographed open, displaying a page that best represents the content, or you might think about how multiple pages could be captured in the image, even if it is just a glimpse of several pages, this also helps to convey the three-dimensionality of the book. Concertina artist books can be photographed open to display multiple pages at once.

Submit your entry documents in the requested file formats

We know many creatives love to use Apple products, however here at the Mornington Peninsula Shire we use PCs! This is a friendly reminder for Mac users to please convert your Pages document into a PDF before submitting your entry via our online form, so that we can open it.  Unfortunately we can’t open Pages documents, just word (doc or docx) or PDF. This will save time in us having to contact you to source the correct file. 

Digital images must be submitted in high res JPEG format, 300dpi 2-3MB

More questions?

Direct all enquiries to our special NWOP email address, and we will respond to you in a friendly and timely manner. nwop@mornpen.vic.gov.au