A fine show
PHOTOGRAPHERS put up a fine show for the 10th Annual Öztan Özatay Photography Competition, a selection from which will be exhibited at the capital’s Atatürk Cultural Centre next month.
The annual competition supports the Kemal Saraçoğlu Foundation for Children with Leukaemia and the Fight Against Cancer, through entry donations of 20TL and 50 per cent of sales proceeds, in memory of photographer and journalist Öztan Özatay, whose family has organised the event since losing him to cancer in 2008.
The 2018 jury selected 129 works by 66 entrants out of a total of 2,543 entries submitted by 134 local and overseas photographers.
A photo catalogue will be prepared for the show which launches on Tuesday, April 3 and will run until Saturday, April 14.
Awards, cash prizes and photographic equipment have already been presented at the Atatürk Cultural Centre.
A portrait titled Buyi Women scooped the Colour Free Theme attainment prize of a Nikon lens for Mehmet Gökyiğit, while the Özatay Photography Special Award went to İnanç Tekgüç for the black-and-white composition Spinal Architecture.
Mehmet Aslan won the Colour Free Theme gold medal for his Salt Lake landscape, and silver went to the portrait Herd by Tufan Bilir, who also scooped the Kemal Saraçoğlu Colour Special Prize for the portrait Mother, while the bronze medal went to Erdal Baykara for his portrait The Pier.
The Black-and-White Özatay awards, also on a free theme, saw a gold medal for Tent Children by Şadiye Yaralı, who also scooped the Türkiye İş Bank award for a second blackand-white portrait entitled Nomad Girl. Rajdeep Biswas was awarded the silver medal for his Juhi 1 submission, followed by Sema Demirkol’s composition Stairs, which won bronze.
The Denktaş Foundation award was won by Bekir Yeşiltaş for the monochrome portrait, Prayer.
Double winners in the Nature Photography colour or black-and-white category included Süleyman Kaplan, who won the Özatay attainment and jury special awards and a Canon lens for his compositions, Life in Nature 78 and Life in Nature 12.
Ertaç Çüneyt scored a double Özatay gold and silver for his nature portraits, Lilac and Balance, while the bronze medal went to Tanfer Aktunç for Öteleğen.
The Türkiye İş Bank Nature Colour award went to Star Wars by Hasan Bağlar, and the Arkın Group Award for Nature and a two-night stay at Gazimağusa’s Palm Beach Hotel went to Başar Taşlı for Eyeball to Eyeball. Kahraman Bekcili’s Library submission won him the Tangül Çağıner Children’s Aid Foundation award, a three-night stay at the Acapulco Hotel Resort.
Kemal Hürdeniz won an Arkın Colony Hotel two-night stay and a cash prize of 1,000TL from MAR Construction as the Most Exhibited Photographer and Most Exhibited Cypriot photographer and also won the McVitie’s Atakom Special Award for his colour portrait Dance at Sky.