Anahid Hamparian First-Place Winner at NY Book Show Competition
Anahid Hamparian First-Place Winner at NY Book Show Competition
By Lucine Kasbarian
The Armenian Reporter International
August 24, 1996
New York, NY -- Ms. Anahid Hamparian of the Bronx, NY, recently won First Place in the Children's/ Young Adult category at the 11th Annual New York Book Show for her part in the jacket design of a book entitled Galax-Arena.
Galax-Arena was one of 600 book and book jacket entries in the NY Book Show's annual competition sponsored by the Bookbinder's Guild of New York. The competition, open to book publishers nationwide, was established in 1985 to recognize the aethetic qualities of books and book jacket designs in adult, children's, fine art, scholastic and trade book categories, among others.
A group of judges hailing from all corners of the publishing world reviewed each book and book jacket entry, which were judged on the basis of ten critical attributes. Book jackets were reviewed for such qualities as composition, concept and use of color while the books themselves were critiqued for paper and book binding quality and font usage.
Galax-Arena won First Place in both book and book jacket categories. "For our purposes, said Joan Slavit, a Bookbinder's Guild spokesperson, "the contents of the books were almost completely irrelevant to this competition. Now I call that judging a book by its cover."
In the case of Galax-Arena, however, the book also happens to have earned acclaim for its content. It earned the "honor book" distinction from the Australian Children's Book Council's "Book of the Year Award." Written by Gillian Rubenstein, illustrated by Joanne Pendola, and published by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, Galax-Arena is a science-fiction novel about children who are kidnapped from earth and taken into outer space to perform death-defying stunts for an alien species.
Anahid is a graphic designer employed by Simon & Schuster who has also worked for such publishing houses and imprints as Harper Collins and Greenwillow Books. A graduate of the Pratt Institute of Art in Brooklyn, NY, Anahid has lent her publishing acumen to many Armenian publications and printed items, including those for the Armenian Prelacy Bookstore of NYC, St. Illuminator's Church in Manhattan, Sts. Vartanantz Church in NJ and the Armenian Youth Federation.
Galax-Arena and all other winning books and jackets will be showcased at the NY Book Show on November 13, 1996 at the 200 Club of the Children in the Fifth Avenue Toy Building in New York City.