I agree with the others who believe that selecting only two of our photographs isn’t enough.
Winning the wallpaper competition for an Ubuntu LTS is a real recognition and acknowledgement, and these past years, the number of default wallpapers in Ubuntu has decreased considerably.
All the major OS (Windows, macOS and other Linux) offer many wallpapers, while Ubuntu is a bit austere.
Selecting the top 5 or top 10 would make us very satisfied as recognized community members !
You are quite right that the our talented, and enthusiastic artistic community is indeed amazing, and each contributor should be recognized for their effort.
I gently suggest that there are LOTS of ways to recognize such talent and effort, and that inclusion in the install .iso image is a fairly limited form of recognition.
Create a Hall of Fame here on Discourse or on the Ubuntu Wiki.
Run quarterly (or even monthly) wallpaper contests here on Discourse.
None of these require any kind of approval by Canonical Staff, nor any special resources. You don’t need to ask for permission. All can be started and managed by any group of community members. Start a new thread to get your fellow enthusiasts organized.
The current wallpaper contest is run by the Desktop Team in order to meet their needs. Their need is specific, and the contest reflects that. If you have found an unmet need or a way to improve the Ubuntu community…DO it.