The Association of Photographic Artists and the Finnish Museum of Photography have granted the Photobook Award 2025 to Juliana Irene Smith's book Good Feelings Every Day. The winner was be chosen by by Emma Bowkett, photography director at FT Weekend Magazine, as well as a photography curator and assistant lecturer at the London College of Communication (LCC).

The winner receives a prize worth 2,000 €, and the other finalists 500 €. 

Emma Bowkett, who selected the winner, says:

"Taken from a sign on the wall of a karaoke bar, the title Good Feelings Every Day, perfectly prepares us for the journey ahead. This is a book that knows exactly what it is doing from the very first page.

The introduction belongs to Smith's husband. It is touching and disarming, a quiet declaration of love that articulates what it means to be truly seen by another person's gaze. He describes how her attention, through photography, allows him to feel valued, held. It is a framework that illuminates everything that follows, this is a book about the radical act of looking and being.

The soft-cover ring binder, with gridded paper gives a sketchbook aesthetic. Full-bleed images sit alongside text as assemblages. Family archive snapshots are disrupted by language that pulls no punches: Dirty Whore Likes Meat. Broken Cunt. The sequencing offers multiple entry points into the work. There is no hierarchy here, pictures of breakfasts and paint-soaked rags are celebrated with the same attention as artworks, family gatherings and self-portraits. This democratic approach is one of Smith's most powerful storytelling tools.

What makes the book extraordinary is its refusal to flinch. The pain and acknowledgement of sexual violence sits alongside political urgency (Free Palestine), alongside the rituals of daily life. This vulnerability is not incidental to the project, it is the project. Layers vibrating with presence, the work is joyful, tender, angry, sexy, political and deeply, generously human. A work that claims agency through the mess of the mundane, that owns trauma rather than being defined by it, that extends an invitation to collective recognition and healing. Good Feelings Every Day does not ask you to observe from a safe distance. It pulls you in, makes you sit uncomfortably, to laugh unexpectedly, and breathe differently. I found myself unable to look away, unable to put it down, wanting to carry it with me so that I too, might feel seen. It is a book of fully feeling." 

Juliana Irene Smith is a California-born, half Iranian artist who has been living and working in Finland for nearly a decade. The 112-page book consists of Smith's photographs, drawings, and works on textiles, as well as texts written by Arvid van der Rijt, Sanna Lehtinen, and Saara Mahbouba. It is her first published book.

Juliana Irene Smith, Good Feelings Every Day, published 2025, 1. edition of 200 copies, UTU Press.
The book cover was designed by Juliana Irene Smith and Toivo Heinimäki. It has been hand-finished and is available in five different colour variations.

The other Photobook Award 2025 finalist are Ulla-Maija Alanen: Horizons of Water and Natalia Kopkina: Liiketutkielma (Veen emo).

The award highlights the book as a form of fine art photography and as an independent art work. The aim of the award is to encourage and motivate authors of photobooks and to invite the public to become familiar with the art form. The award is granted to a Finnish photographic artist or an artist residing in Finland. In spring 2026 the award is granted for a book published in 2025.

The Photobook Award 2025 books are available for purchase at shop.hippolyte.fi and the gallery's bookshop at Yrjönkatu 8–10. 

The Photobook Award has been supported by Kuvasto.