Moscow, Moscow …
This year has seen the birth of yet another major World wide photographic ‘award’ – the “Moscow International Foto Awards” … or “MIFA”.
Apparently MIFA’s mission is to recognize, reward and expose talented photographers from around the world and introduce them to the creative community in Russia”. No too sure how useful that may be in the big scheme of things … but, hey … will try anything once.
I frugally submitted one lone pic … my portrait of the loverly burns survivor Carol Mayer … and promptly forgot about it. Sadly so did they … up to a point! No congratulatory email at results time and I questioned, as you do, the credentials of the judges before moving on to other things.
Ten days later I DO get an email opening thus – “Congratulations once again, please find enclosed your MIFA’14 Winner Seal”. I several times checked the list of winners and honourable mentions … no Brian and no Carol … and puzzled I sent them an email. They told me to ‘look again’. Same result …
My next few emails went unanswered … until today when I at last get an email stating “Apologies! Yes, we found out there was a bug in our system which removed some of the HM winners that’s why it wasn’t showing. We have fixed it.”
So there you go … an Honourable Mention (and there was an awful lot of ’em) in the Portrait category of the inaugural “Moscow International Foto Awards”. Sure takes the gloss off it …
Anyway … below is my Hon Mention pic from the “MIFA” website.
Image ©Brian Cassey
‘Carol’ Does it Again …
Will have to get on the ‘blower’ again to voice yet another sincere vote of ‘Thanks’ to my amazin’ portrait subject Carol Mayer.
This morning (Sunday), during a live awards streaming event (which I didn’t bother to watch), it was announced that my “The Skin I’m In- II” image of burns survivor Carol … took out “3rd Place – Honor of Distinction” in the Portrait category of the huge 2018 “International Color Awards” (11th Annual Edition).
There were a host of great portraits made by some very accomplished photographers selected as ‘Nominees’ in the ‘Portrait’ section … so it was very rewarding to be amongst the top three ‘Honorees’. (Although I wish they would learn to spell ‘Honour’ and ‘Honourees’ … and ‘Colour’ … correctly.) Rounding out the top three were portraits by winner Boy Surminski from The Netherlands and second placed Azin Haghighi from Iran.
“The Skin I’m In – II’ has also been recognised by the 2017 ‘National Photographic Portrait Prize’ and several others.
… ‘uge Thanks’ once again Carol …
Image © Brian Cassey