Ahmad Bin Mohammad honours winners of Hamdan photography award

Dubai: Shaikh Ahmad Bin Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Chairman of the Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Knowledge Foundation, on Wednesday honoured the winners of the sixth edition of the Hamdan Bin Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum International Photography Award (HIPA) at Dubai Opera.

The honouring ceremony began with playing the UAE national anthem followed by a welcoming speech by Ali Khalifa Bin Thalith, Secretary-General of HIPA, during which he thanked Shaikh Hamdan Bin Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Dubai Crown Prince, for his patronage. He highlighted that the sixth edition titled “The Challenge” received more than 33,950 pictures, bringing the total number of pictures received since the award’s inception to more than a quarter million.

Bin Thalith also unveiled a new yearly humanitarian project as part of the award dubbed “For You”. Details of the project will be announced later.

Shaikh Ahmad then honoured winners of special awards. American photographer Elliott Erwitt won the Photography Appreciation Award. Erwitt had served as the president of Magnum agency for three terms and has authored more than 30 books on photography.

Shaikh Ahmad also honoured the Omani arts foundation, Bait Al Zubair, for winning the Photography Research/Report Award.

Abdul Rahman Mohammad Al Owais, Minister of Health and Prevention and Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the HIPA, honoured winners of the Portfolio category. Italian photographer Giovanni Cedronella won the first place followed by French photographer Gilles Nicolet, polish photographer Rafal Makiela, Slovenian photographer Matjaz Krivic and Chinese photographer Qiu Yan in that order.

Mohammad Al Murr, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Mohammad Bin Rashid Arabic Language Award, honoured winners in the ‘Digital Manipulation’ category. Al Murr honoured Shahrzad Akrami from Iran, who was placed first in the category, Dmitry Rogozhkin from Russia who came second and Salem Saeed Bawazir from Yemen, Lubna Abdul Aziz from Egypt and Leyla Emektar from Turkey came in the next three places.

Saeed Mohammad Al Nabouda, Acting Director-General of Dubai Culture and Arts Authority and Deputy Chairman of HIPA, honoured winners in the award’s ‘Colour’ subcategory. Al Nabouda presented the award to Giuseppe Bonali from Italy, who came first in the subcategory. In the ‘Black and White’ category, he honoured the first place winner, Apurba Malek from India.