Thanks to a snapshot in black and white, showing a simple figure of a young boy, captured in flight, typical of a soccer player who is about to kick a ball in a somersault, by the soteropolitan Tiago Silva Nonato, has won the International Competition for Photographers sponsored by the ICBIE, as part of the the project, ‘The Ball Is Round.’ A total of 32 photographs were submitted to the email address of our Institute, most of them by amateur photographers, but there were also a few by professionals. In many of the submissions, there was an attempt to give an original idea of soccer, sometimes attempting to instill in the observer an impression that is far removed from what one usually imagines when thinking of the “world’s most beautiful game.”
As was stated previously (in the post, “The Ball Is Round”), the competition, organized in collaboration with the German Lahn Artists association – and, in particular, with the concrete help of the Englishman Steve Whitton, a very passionate soccer player and fan, and also a great ICBIE fan – began on the 15th of June, ending on the 12th of July. In both occasions, the participating photographs were projected on our big screen and voted upon by the visitors. It must also be said that the photos were also posted on the Institute’s Facebook page, where the 32 works were also voted upon by people who saw them there.
And so, after counting the votes, the choices of the public that joined us last Saturday were added to those already counted. The winning photo obtained a total of 62 votes, while the photo in second place, entitled ‘It’s my ball’ (by Marcella Sgura Viana), portrayed a child with the ball under his arm at the moment he was leaving his companions, received 54. Further behind, with 19 votes, the third place photo, (by Rá Trindade). The special prize, given to the best photo coming from a resident outside Brazil, went to Celso Castillo from Spain, which received 16 votes. The artistic director of the ICBIE, Pietro Gallina, presented the certificates and the prizes (books, CDs and DVDs) to the first two, who were present that evening. The image of the winning photo, showing a move born in 1914 in Chile, (and for that reason, in most South American countries it is called a chilena, while in Brazil it is called a bicycle), was mastered by the great center forwards and was immortalized by the editor of the souvenir cards of the world’s most renowned soccer players, the somersault, a technical tour de force of devastating prowess, (and for that reason, is photogenic by definition), conquered – with merit – the favor of the public at the ICBIE. (A. Z.).
