Winners of the annual Walkley Awards for Excellence in Journalism were announced last night.
Newcastle Herald journalist Joanne McCarthy was named as winner of the prestigious Gold WalkleyAward for spearheading a long-running investigation into the sexual abuse of children, primarily by Catholic clergy, in Newcastle and the Hunter Valley.
In the photography categories, which are sponsored by Nikon, Justin McManus of The Age was named as Press Photographer of the Year for the ‘new dimensions and interesting compositions’ he has brought to photographs that capture everyday events. Nic Walker, who contributes to AFR Magazine, The Weekend Financial Review and “The Kattle Run” took out the top award for Daily Life / Feature Photography. Winner of the News Photography award was Lukas Coch of Australian Associated Press for a picture of the Australia Day protest.
The Photographic Essay award went to Sam Ruttyn of The Sunday Telegraph for a series of pictures if a child under treatment for a life-threatening brain tumour. Phil Hillyard of The Daily Telegraph won the Sport Photography award for a series of images that captured every moment of Sally Pearson’s 100m hurdles victory at the London Olympics. The award for Best Broadcast Camerawork went to Gary Ramage of News Limited for “This is Afghanistan”, raw footage of Australian and Afghan soldiers fighting the Taliban.
A complete list of the winners with illustrations of their work can be found at http://www.walkleys.com/files/media/WalkleyAwardWinners2012Booklet.pdf.
