MacDonald wins 2024 Margaret Mahy Illustration Prize

Herb MacDonald is the winner of the 2024 Margaret Mahy Illustration Prize, the Margaret Mahy Estate, Hachette Aotearoa New Zealand, and Little Moa have announced.

The judging panel praised MacDonald’s illustrations as witty and inventive, and commended the interplay between the text and pictures in his illustrations for Mahy’s story The Great White Man-Eating Shark (Hachette). The judges said MacDonald’s ‘cheeky “Norvin-esque” swimmers could entertain and enthral each season’s pod of readers’.

MacDonald lives in Titirangi, Auckland, and was born and raised in South Waikato. He credits the endless supply of paper at the Tokoroa Paper Mill as the beginning of his love of drawing. After a career in advertising, including running his own design business for the past 15 years, MacDonald said he was excited to be rediscovering his passion for illustration.

As the winner, MacDonald receives NZ$2000, as well as NZ$500 worth of Hachette books. The winner of last year’s award was Alba Gil Celdran for Seventeen Kings and Forty-Two Elephants (Little Moa).

Launched in 2019, the annual Margaret Mahy Illustration Prize offers ‘a unique opportunity for an unpublished New Zealand-based illustrator to illustrate Margaret Mahy’s classic stories’.

More information about the prize and MacDonald’s winning illustrations are available on the prize website.

Category: Awards Local news