Annual Juried Exhibit Celebrates Excellence in University Press Design
The Association of University Presses (AUPresses) proudly announces the juried selections for its 2026 Book, Jacket, and Journal Show. These outstanding examples of university press publications are now on virtual display at https://design.up.hcommons.org/.
The annual show honors the recent thoughtful and creative work of design and production teams, extending a long tradition of excellence in design in the university press community and—through a traveling exhibit and acclaimed annual catalog of selected entries—illustrating the tenets of good design.
Open to works published in 2025 by AUPresses member publishers worldwide, this year’s competition attracted 505 submissions in these categories:
- Scholarly books, typographic and illustrated
- Trade books, typographic and illustrated
- Poetry and literature books
- Reference books
- Journals
- Jackets and covers (of books and journals)
“The creativity, excellence, and innovation of the AUPresses community shines in the Book, Jacket, and Journal Show, and this year was no different. The quality and imagination evident across submissions is an inspiration,” said Book, Jacket, and Journal Show Committee co-chairs Alison Cobra, Marketing Specialist at the University of Calgary Press, and Corey Parson, Acting Director at the University of North Georgia Press. “It has been a pleasure to work with our committee and jurors to bring this year’s show to life.”
The 2026 show jurors, who gathered in February at the AUPresses office in New York to evaluate entries, are:
- Kelley Galbreath, based in West Virginia, has created covers and interiors in a wide range of genres for clients including Chronicle Books, Quarto, Timber Press, University of Virginia Press, and Johns Hopkins University Press. Her work has been recognized by the AIGA’s 50 Books/50 Covers, Communication Arts, Print, the One Show, PaperSpecs, and the ADDYs.
- Silas Munro is founder of the Polymode design studio, based in Los Angeles and Raleigh; curator or co-curator of several exhibitions, including Reverberations: Lineages in Design History at the Ford Foundation Gallery in 2025; Founding Faculty and Chair Emeritus of the MFA Program in Graphic Design at Vermont College of Fine Arts; and co-author of the first BIPOC-centered design history course, Black Design in America: African Americans and the African Diaspora in Graphic Design 19th-21st Century.
- Mary Ann Smith, based in New York, has illustrated for magazines, newspapers, and the web, and has designed book covers for major and independent publishers. Her clients have included Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, Hachette Book Group, St Martin’s Press, Harlequin, Columbia University Press, Ohio State University Press, She Writes Press, The New York Times, and The Washington Post.
- Rush Jackson is the founder of Rush Jackson Studio in Brooklyn, New York, offering design and creative direction services to cultural institutions, arts organizations, publishers, artists, curators, and other cultural producers. Notable recent projects In the Black Fantastic (Thames & Hudson, 2022), Arielle Bobb-Willis: Keep the Kid Alive (Aperture, 2024), and Prospect Park: Photographs of a Brooklyn Oasis, 1980 to 2025 (Prestel, 2025). Jackson’s work has been recognized by AIGA’s 50 Books/50 Covers.
“Serving as jurors this year was rigorous and, at its best, genuinely energizing,” Munro remarked. “Much of this came from being with my fellow judges—Kelley, Mary Ann, and Rush—who brought a spirit of camaraderie, curiosity, and healthy debate.”
Galbreath and Munro identified 46 outstanding book and journal entries from a field of 162 submissions. “Books in this year’s show offered no shortage of thoughtful, creative, and conceptually engaging examples of what a great university press book can be,” Galbreath observed. “It was an honor to be part of this process and thank you for submitting such beautiful work! You made our jobs tricky, in the best way possible.”
Smith and Jackson selected the top 48 jacket and cover entries for the show, from 343 entries. “We saw strong, whimsical, quiet, and classic uses of type and imagery,” Smith said. “Innovative production techniques were also used to great effect.”
“What stood out to me were the number of entries with really intentional image-making choices and entries that found ways to unify type, illustration, photo, and other visual elements into cohesive final products,” Jackson noted. “I also found myself drawn to covers that considered typography as a main priority, embracing a type-as-image sort of approach.”
“Bravo to the talented designers and art directors whose creativity turned out such exciting covers,” Smith concluded. “The experience of viewing, contemplating, and discussing each cover design was uniquely informative and inspiring and one I won’t soon forget.”
The publications, jackets, and covers honored this year will be displayed during the 2026 AUPresses Annual Meeting in Seattle in June, where the jurors are also expected to be on hand to share their insights with attendees. In addition, the exhibition of selected works will travel, visiting select member institutions through May 2027.
For the third year, unselected books were donated to the Book Cellar. Located in the Webster Branch of the New York Public Library (NYPL), this nonprofit bookstore contributes more than $100,000 annually to support NYPL branch library services.
The traveling exhibition of the 2025 show made its debut in Hong Kong in March—hosted by member presses Chinese University of Hong Kong Press, City University of Hong Kong Press, and Hong Kong University Press—and will complete its tour in June (schedule available here).
