Posters for shows starring Jessica Fostekew and Sofie Hagen have been victorious at this year's Comedy Poster Awards.
Jessica Fostekew's poster for Hench won the Panel Award. The photographer was Idil Sukan and the designer was Chris Lince.
Sofie Hagen's poster for The Bumswing won the Audience Award, voted for by the public. The photographer was Matt Crockett and the designer was Haiminh Le.
Voting for the Audience Award took place on a dedicated website over the past 6 weeks, powered by British Comedy Guide.
The panel of judges, who voted on the posters independently, comprised of BBC Comedy Commissioner Sarah Asante; Head of Development for Expectation Entertainment, Howard Cohen; BAFTA-nominated Director Ben Mallaby; Art Director from THIS IS TOMMY Pete Collins; and Senior Content Producer, Accelerated Intelligence, Julia McGill.
British Comedy Guide editors Mark Boosey and Aaron Brown say of this year’s awards: “Almost 250 posters were entered into this year’s competition, with an exceptional level of quality exhibited across the board. The artwork that adorns Scotland’s fair capital each summary is widely varied and inventive, and we’re delighted to be able to honour two very worthy winners with the 2019 Panel and Audience awards. Here’s to another fantastically creative, eye-catching year ahead!”
Talking about their winner, Fostekew’s Hench, the judges said:
Howard Cohen: “Congratulations to the amazing Jess, she’s clearly on the up and winning this prize only adds to the rise. Major respect to the designer Chris Lince and the comedy photo legend Idil Sukan. Oooh and major shout out to the short-listed Caroline Mabey for her poster - it’s a furry triumph!”
Pete Collins: “Mixing an image that demands a double-take along with a striking colour palette and considered typography, the Hench poster brings intrigue, braveness and a smile to the mind.”
Ben Mallaby: “It’s a work of art and perfectly complements the show.”
Sofie Hagen said of her win: ‘I am lucky to have found people to work with who say ‘yes’ when I have got a silly idea, like the photographer Matt Crockett, the designer Haiminh Le and the fashion designer Jazmin Lee from Plus Equals who made the jumpsuit in the photo. It’s what the fringe is all about. Deciding to have a poster that people think is a Magic Eye poster so they stand in front of it staring for hours. I’m very happy.’
Jessica Fostekew said: ‘Oh. THIS IS NICE. Thank you. Massive hats off to Idil Sukan my genius photographer and also to Chris Lince for designing a poster that best showed off Idil’s incredible work. After Lou Sanders won this a few years ago with an image of her holding an animal, everyone started holding animals in their posters. So fingers crossed everybody will be naked in theirs next year now. Shall we just all do it? Yeah? Yeah.”
