Works on political protest, environmental change and more awarded Kolga Tbilisi Photo prizes
A now-iconic photograph of a Palestinian civilian during last year’s protest for the Right of Return. Photo: Mustafa Hassouna.
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Photography enthusiasts with a wide range of works were awarded at this month’s Kolga Tbilisi Photo festival, as winning series and individual shots showing political struggle, climate change effects and other moments were singled out for honours in the capital city.
Organisers revealed the judges’ selection of the most distinguished participants throughout the past week, when the final display of the festival was also opened.
The juries were tasked with identifying their favourites as the event aimed to be “exceptional for the number of powerful photography projects covering a wide range of topics”.
Fausto Podavini secured the Documentary Series category prize for his project And I Will Make the Rivers Dry, which portrays people of Kenya’s Turkana County and their relationship with Lake Turkana, the largest permanent lake in a desert, within climate change developments.
In the last decades, data from the Kenyan government show a clear tendency to increase the average temperatures in the whole Country and in the County of Turkana.
It’s in this context that the Turkana population had to look for alternatives to live: first shepherds, over the years, had to adapt to become fishermen.
The award for the Reportage Series went to Mustafa Hassouna, who covered a political and civil rights struggle in his work on the Palestinian Rights of Return Protests. The latter unfolded as hundreds of civilians were killed and many more injured by the Israeli military during the clash last year.
The jury used the Conceptual Series award to distinguish Kate Mellor, as her Topographies of the Image project viewed post-industrial architectural sites of major buildings by internationally recognised architects.
A mythology grew that architecture could change the fortunes of cities but this kind of building was also heavily criticized for becoming detached from the locality [...] The work reflects on the photographic reappearing in the aspect of the architecture.
The Best Portrait prize was claimed by Mikhail Grebenshikov and his photo titled Outline, with two other single-piece works, Nigel Dickinson’s Effigy Of Prime Minister Theresa May At Lewes Bonfire and Jelena Jankovic’s Selfie Culture, taking the Best One Shot award.
Lorenzo Mangialardi was honoured with the award for the festival’s Mobile Series prize for his black-and-white work I Entrust My Soul to You, an emotionally difficult series of photographs taken during his mother’s ongoing struggle against cancer.
Rounding off the honours, Johannes Glinka took the Newcomer Photo Award of the annual Kolga event with Belgrade Refugees, a mix of portraits and scenes looking at the Serbian capital’s Central Station-turned refugee camp.
Glinka’s snaps show personalities, mostly from Afghanistan, looking to enter Europe via the southern regions and having to spend their days in dire circumstances in the Station, one of many locations serving similar purpose across the continent.
Beside handing out prizes, Kolga Tbilisi Photo organisers also hosted displays including one celebrating the legacy of Marc Riboud, a well-known French photographer and recipient of the Leica Lifetime Achievement Award, the Prix Nadar and the Sony World Photography Award, among other honours.
The programme for the festival also had a date reserved for a showcase of nine young Georgian photographers in the basement of Mantashevi Rows, a historical Old Town location on Bambis Rigi Street on Mtkvari River bank.
In two other shows of the festival, the OSTLOOK online platform and the Sputnik Photos collective focused on the subject of eastern European and post-Soviet space, while well-known photographers and curators reviewed portfolios of professional and amateur creatives.