The Contest Jury

A long-standing Art Director with Mondadori Ragazzi, and since 2017, also with Piemme for the Battello a Vapore and Geronimo Stilton brands, Fernando has worked with some of Italy’s best illustrators, witnessing their successful career paths. He has been involved in the planning and roll-out of several famous imprints in the world of children’s publishing, twice receiving the Award of Excellence of the magazine Communication Arts.  Fernando has been on the juries of several international competitions. A graphic artist, he loves the typographic medium, punk music and sad movies.

 

Zosia Dzierżawska studied comparative literature at Warsaw’s University and then Illustration in Milan. She is a co-founder of the firm Armad’illo, an illustration and graphic design company headquartered in Milan. She works with a range of different international publishers, mostly Polish, Italian and French, specializing in children’s books, editorial illustrations and comics. Her work was selected for the Bologna Children’s Book Fair Illustrators Exhibition twice - in 2014 and 2017 - and also by the New York Society of Illustrators. Zosia now lives in Warsaw 

A Pedagogy graduate tutored by Professor Antonio Faeti, Grazia Gotti is a co-founder of the historic “Giannino Stoppani” bookstore and the cultural cooperative of the same name. An illustration authority, she has organised exhibitions of Italian and foreign artists. In 2003, she started the Accademia Drosselmeier, a Study Centre offering training to booksellers. Her long-term collaboration with Bologna Children’s Book Fair and extensive travel abroad have given her an in-depth understanding of the global children’s book publishing scene. Grazia gives presentations in Italy and abroad on the history of children’s publishing as well as on literature and poetry for children and young adults, recently starting a new project, the Junior Poetry Festival. In 2013, she published her first book on her ten-year experience as a primary school teacher, A Scuola con i libri. This was followed by other books, her latest in 2022: Alla lettera L. Libri & Librerie, Bompiani. She chaired the National Committee organising events to mark the centenary of the birth of Gianni Rodari, curating Rodari a colori, a section dedicated to illustrations of Rodari’s works in the book on Gianni Rodari published by Mondadori in its I Meridiani series. Grazie also writes the “Mappamondi” column in the magazine “Liber” published in Florence. She also collaborates with the “Italian Excellence” exhibition series.

A promoter of cultural events by profession, for over twenty years Elena has engaged with the world of publishing and illustration for children and young adults. Under her management, Bologna Children’s Book Fair, the world’s leading event for books and content for young readers, received the Eric Carle Honors’ Bridge category award for ‘bringing together books and their publishers from around the world to promote and sustain dialogue between different cultures’. In recent years, Elena has been involved in developing BolognaFiere’s new exhibitions and partnerships outside Italy, especially in the United States and China. She is also on the Board of Centro per il Libro e la Lettura, and a member of the Executive Committee of IBBY International. 

Teaching specialist and coordinator of Urbino’s ISIA Masters course in Illustration, Silvana is a co-founder of the Giannino Stoppani Children’s Bookstore in Bologna. She has curated many visual art and book exhibitions.