How to submit
This link will take you to a simple form where you can submit your work.
Please note there is a $30 submission fee that needs to be paid.
Please submit by April 30th to be considered. Under no circumstances will we extend the deadline or accept late submissions.
What we offer
Our Open Call runs every two years and for the 2026 Open Call we are looking for two projects to publish.
a) One submission will be published as a book by Tall Poppy Press, with a budget of $10,000
b) A second awarded project will be published as a book by us, with a budget of $5,000
Every submission will receive feedback from us via email
Both awarded projects will be published in 2027 or 2028.
Both awarded projects will receive our best time, design, printing and launching efforts, and artists will become one of the family. Awarded projects will be shared at book fairs around the world, at stores we stock at and proudly at our studio and HQ.
We also offer a team who is on your side, working with you to find a compelling way to share your art work, people who are excited, enthusiastic and able to help. The best books come from great partnerships.
We value the submissions greatly and are excited by the work people share with us each time.
1. Please read the FAQ on the right and email us to clarify anything, our email is hello@tallpoppypress.xyz
2. Think about why you’d like to publish with us, specifically. You may find it useful to read a bit about us here or here.
3. Please write clearly and simply, like you talk. This isn’t a writing assignment, it’s not an academic hurdle task. We just want to understand where you’re coming from.
4. It’s ok not to have a specific answer to a question, you can just share what you’re thinking of or hoping for
From there we will create a shortlist and the written responses become more important in sorting out which of the short listed submissions would make the most sense for us to publish.
When we look at the written resposnes we’re looking at who we think would be a good fit, how well people’s aspirations for their work line up with what we do well, alignment between Tall Poppy Press and the artist and whether there’s a reasonable business case for the work. We’re a business after all and our aim is to create excellent things that sell.
1. Who can apply
Tall Poppy Press exclusively publishes books by Australian artists, work made in Australia or collaborations between Australians and non-Australians.
You can apply if your project has something to do with Australia, or you do, or you’re partnering with an Australian artist, organisation, institution. We just need some connection to Australia, but we’re very open to what that looks like.
Previous books published have come from people who have moved here, lived here their whole lives, been co-authored by Australians and non-Australians, and been curatorial projects that include Australian work.
Our awardees vary in age, location, ethnic background and experience. We’ve awarded people while they are still studying, artists who are very established and who live all over Australia.
It’s fine if there’s a component of writing, but we aren’t accepting submissions that are solely writing. So no novels, no critical books, no poetry - not without a lot of visuals!
While we’re avid readers, this is not what we publish. Sorry we just don’t know how to make that well, it’s not our thing.
We are very open to archival projects and curatorial projects. To us, a curatorial project is something where the author is collating or collecting different images/artists to highlight or showcase something.
Our Site Specific book is a good example of this.
If your project isn’t finished that’s ok - as long as you can provide some examples of what you’re making, want to make, or proposing.
In broad terms, Tall Poppy Press was started in 2021 by Matt Dunne to provide a home for Australian artists to publish books in a financially fair way.
Since then, we’ve published ~15 titles with a focus on photography, and an expansion into painting as well.
Our books focus on good editing, textural exploration of book making and work that will find a local and international audience.
Throughout the year, we travel to book fairs across the world to showcase and sell our books.
Tall Poppy Press is owned and operated by Matt Dunne, in partnership with Morganna Magee.
a) We want to make sure that people who are submitting are being considerate and thoughtful. We think a small payment means there’s fewer folks just throwing their hat in the ring.
b) We give every submission feedback. This takes time.
c) Running the award costs money - website hosting, typeform sites (these are surprisingly pricey), etc - it’s not a huge amount but we want to ensure those costs are covered.
Generally we start by discussing why we each want to make a book, working through what our aims and hopes for the book are.
We then land on some basic parameters about what we’re making, when it’ll be released, etc.
At this point we share our basic guidelines - a document that outlines who is responsible for what and outlining some of the nitty gritty.
Then we get stuck into the making, designing, etc.
When the book is released we focus on having an attractive launch, media plan and lining the release up with opportunities for sales.
Each of these parts is an open conversation and negotiation. We don’t railroad you, but we do expect to find a good middle ground.
If you’re curious it might be worth asking artists we’ve published how they found it :) .
Publishing is a partnership and it’s important that everyone gets along.
We endeavour for profit sharing with artists, as books sell. And at times have also split the print run with artists (they can sell books and keep the cash). Neither of these models are perfect. We’re just trying to be as generous as we can be and still pay our bills.
Successful artists are welcome to add extra money to the budget, apply for grants, work with us to find publishing partners, and work together to increase the budget too. This is not something we take into account during the selection process. We don’t want to priviledge the well off. But just to be clear, there is scope for more.
We can’t really offer one on one advice. Firstly it wouldn’t be very fair. Secondly we don’t have much time.
Matt has a new baby daughter to look after, books to make and a business to run. Time is at a premium right now :(
Of course we’re happy to answer clarifying questions and if you’re in doubt please do ask, the worst we can say is ‘hey in the interest of fairness we’re not going to answer that’.
We do approach artists with an offer to publish if we love their work. Each year we find 2-3 people either at workshops or whose work we’ve been following that we want to publish. We then reach out.
We are fairly active and, if you’re working on something that’s not ready for this award, consider inviting us to an opening, or exhibition, or anything like that when it happens.
Otherwise we like to find work organically. For better or worse, it’s just the way we are.
When we say that the deadline is April 30th that means if you send us something on May 1st we are not reading it. We will not extend the deadline at all under any circumstances.
Please do not leave submitting until the last minute. We will not be flexible on this at all.
We really value working with people who are prompt, work with timelines and are organised.
Each time we have run the award a few folks ask if they can submit late. Sorry, that is not something we’ll accept.
Last Updated 24.10.31