Judges
Alex Telfer
Award Winning Photographer
Alex Telfer is a director and advertising/editorial photographer born and raised in the North of England, where he still lives. He carries out commissions for a range of advertising agencies across the UK, Europe and USA and recent projects include campaigns for Nikon Cameras, Ernst and Young, Wella Hair Care, Sport England and the BBC.
Alex has run his own advertising photography business since 1992 and during the past three years has successfully developed his direction showreel with commercials for Guinness, One NorthEast, The Scottish Government, Quantum Insurance Claims and Middlesbrough Football Club.
Alex’s current studio is housed in a converted 19th century church, which he purchased in 2004. The complete design scheme for the property was carried out by Alex and is home to a gallery, which regularly show cases Alex’s new projects.
Andy Balman
Gallery Owner, Balman Gallery
Andy Balman is a cultural entrepreneur who has worked in the arts for nearly 30 years. In the 1980s and 90s he managed and programmed Newcastle’s legendary Riverside venue, which integrated two popular music venues, rehearsal and recording studios, restaurant and exhibition space under one roof and ran a World Music agency and listings magazine Nirvana, Oasis, Happy Mondays, David Bowie and Elvis Costello all played there.
In 2002 he established the Biscuit Factory, Europe’s largest commercial art gallery, in Newcastle, managing it for five years.
In 2007 he co-founded the Newcastle Gateshead Art Fair - now recognised as one of the most important outside London, exhibiting work from galleries representing artists from the UK and internationally.
More recently he has established the Balman Gallery in Corbridge. Aimed at the serious collector the gallery represents UK and international artists often being the only gallery outside London and the South East to do so. He recently opened a satellite gallery at Complete Smile Dental Clinic in South Shields and established a bursary; Branley and Balman Gallery Bursary, with its owner Allen Branley, to support young artists from the North East who are pursuing a career through art college.
Andy maintains an interest in the music industry co-owning two venues in Hull and acts as a consultant currently working on a large, multi-function venue in Qatar, Doha. He is on the board of a number of cultural bodies in the region.
Wayne Hemingway MBE
Designer
One of Britain’s most highly acclaimed designers, Wayne Hemingway MBE co-founded the fashion label Red or Dead with wife Gerardine.
The label received global acclaim, winning the prestigious British Fashion Council’s Streetstyle Designer of the Year Award in 1996, 1997 and 1998.
Wayne and Gerardine sold Red or Dead and, in 1999, set up HemingwayDesign, which specialises in affordable and social design.
Its highest profile project is The Staiths South Bank, an 800 property housing project on Tyneside which has won a series of awards.
The company has also been involved with projects in Maidenhead, Aylesbury and Kings Lynn and has worked with West Lancs Council and English Partnerships as well as with Copeland Borough Council and the North West Development Agency.
Wayne is the Chairman of Building for Life, a CABE (Commission for Architecture and The Built Environment) funded organisation that promotes excellence in the quality of design of new housing, Chair of the South Coast Design Forum and on the Design Council Trustee Board and the Design Council CABE Committee.
An MBE, he is a Professor in The Built Environment Department of Northumbria University, a Doctor of Design at Wolverhampton, Lancaster and Stafford and a Fellow of Blackburn College.
He writes for architectural and housing publications and judges international design competitions. A regular speaker on housing, urban design, education and the creative sector, Wayne also carries out charity work for Noise Festival, The Princes Trust, Shelter and Oxfam.
Ted Ditchburn
Managing Director,
North News and Pictures
Ted’s career in journalism began in 1972 on a Pre-entry Press Photography course in the West Midlands. After working on newspapers in the Midlands and Cumbria he came to the North East, joining the Evening Chronicle and Journal in 1978 where he met his wife Jane, a Sunday Sun reporter, in the early 80’s.
They spent a couple of years in the West Country with Jane working as a news editor on the Sunday Independent while Ted embarked on a national newspaper freelance career.
On returning to the North East in 1984 they founded North News and Pictures and have been building up the company ever since. The company now has more than 25 staff working in the agency, now refocusing on video and online content management alongside traditional news and features, stories and pictures and the PR photography they have always done.
Ted has worked for every major national newspaper in the UK and most magazines, as well as titles across the world. He has also worked for major companies in PR shoots across the region and the UK.
Ted was a Director of Cambridge-based mobile phone content management firm Fonestarz from 2000 to 2006 and Director and CEO of online management firm 2daymedia from 2004 to date.
Agnes Wilkie
Creative Director,
Northern Film and Media
Agnes is Northern Film & Media’s Creative Team Director. She has played an integral role in delivering a number of investments including United, Vera, Inspector George Gently, Joe Maddison’s War and One Night in Turin.
Agnes heads up NFM‘s Creative team and has launched initiatives like NE Doc, Jesting About and Shorted, working with partner organisations including the BBC, Channel 4 and Soda Pictures.
Agnes joined NFM from TRC Media, where she was Head of International Development. Agnes was previously Head of Features and Entertainment at STV.
Geoff Wonfor
Film and Television Director
Geoff Wonfor began his career in Britain as a cameraman and film editor, working for ITV and the BBC in England. In 1974 he became a freelance director working on documentaries, entertainment and music specials. During the mid-seventies he made short films with England’s international soccer star Malcolm McDonald and world heavyweight boxing champion, Muhammad Ali.
In 1981 he was appointed Senior Director for a weekly rock show for Channel Four, which launched in 1982. ‘The Tube’ was a 90 minute ‘live’ show, with featured specials on location and filmed inserts. It ran for five years and consolidated Geoff’s reputation for inventing new stylistic approaches. His output ranges from classical concerts through the great stars of popular music to the cutting edge of new and experimental bands.
Having worked with Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr individually, they chose Geoff to put together the acclaimed ‘Beatles Anthology’ for video and network television in the early ‘90s.
He has also worked with Tina Turner, Stevie Wonder, Prince, Oasis, George Michael, Mick Jagger, Fats Domino, Sting, Dire Straits and Elton John, to name but a few.
Geoff’s other credits include: ‘Stella’ a profile of fashion designer Stella McCartney; ‘Gorilla Gorilla,’ an account of a project which introduces gorillas bred in captivity in the UK back into the wild; Jools Holland and Friends, a concert held at London’s Royal Albert Hall and Band Aid 20, a film to mark the 20th anniversary of the Band Aid project.
Carol Malia
Newsreader, BBC North East & Cumbria
Instantly recognisable to viewers of North East news programme Look North, Carol is a local girl born and bred.
She qualified as a senior journalist after training in Darlington and became chief reporter for the Hartlepool Mail in 1989.
She went on to enjoy spells at BBC Radio Cumbria and Border Television in Carlisle before returning to Tyneside to work for Tyne Tees.
She has presented Look North for the BBC for more than 12 years and enjoys hiking and exploring the great outdoors in her spare time.
Susan Wear
Corporate Affairs Director,
Port of Tyne
Susan Wear is the Corporate Affairs Director of the Port of Tyne. Her job is to broaden the award-winning Port’s presence in the region and nationally, to help develop its role as a generator of economic growth for North East England and to build upon the work supporting the development of the many local communities served by the Port.
Formerly a journalist and Chief Reporter on the Newcastle Journal, Susan managed communications for the 1990 National Garden Festival at Gateshead in her first role in Public Relations and has since worked in the private sector, local government, health, and in tourism. She helped establish the Newcastle Gateshead destination marketing agency, Newcastle Gateshead Initiative, which led the 2008 European Capital of Culture bid.
She has also campaigned nationally and internationally to promote the region’s World Heritage sites of Durham and Hadrian’s Wall, and some of the region’s major regeneration projects, including Gateshead’s Millennium Bridge and BALTIC, Newcastle’s Quayside developments, Teesside Power Station and the City of Sunderland where she helped develop its international profile to bring in jobs and investment.