By Nana Kobaidze
The award ceremony of the New Wine Festival photo contest was held on June 11, 2014 at the National Parliamentary Library of Georgia. Organized by the Wine Club, the event has already entered its fifth year and has acquired a lot of supporters and amateurs photo enthusiasts who look forward to the festival every year.
New Wine Festival has established itself as a big celebration of artisanal and large-scale winemaking and has become a joyful experience for its visitors. A cornucopia of high quality wine selected by a tasting panel of wine experts makes this event exceptional. Held at the Open Air Museum of Ethnography, the festival has al arge number of visitors who are givent the opportunity to taste a variety of wines. Last year, for example, the number of visitors reached 20,000. Most of these visitors are ordinary people who are eager to learn more about Georgian Wine and its market or who simply want to enjoy the taste of delicious wine. It is worth noting that the festival participants are mostly young people, which shows the youth’s growing interest in the wine culture. The photo contest, while held for for the first time this year, expands the crowd’s composition by attracting the people who are interested not just in wine but also in photography.
There were four nominations to be awarded: 1. ‘The Best Photo’ to be selected based on the number of Facebook Likes, 2. The ‘Most Sober’ Photo, 3. The Craziest Selfie and 4. The Wine Club’s Favorite.
The winner photo of the first prize, which received 645 likes on the Wine Club’s Facebook page, was taken by David Khachaturiani. Teka Jamakashvili’s photo was given the award of “Wine Club’s Favorite.” Vanichka Stepanishvili was announced to be the winner of the “Most Sober” award. Finally, “The Craziest Selfie” award was given to Tiko Gogishvili. Each winner was given a box of wine by the Kera Wine Company.
One additional nomination, “The Documentalist of New Wine Festival 2014,” was also announced as a surprise by Iago Bitarishvili, who is one of the supporters of the festival. The award was given to the photographer Givi Tukhashvili. It was his first visit at the New Fine Festival. He found himself so fascinated by the event that it resulted in his taking lots of pictures of the festival.
At the end of the ceremony, the presenter showed a raw video material of the most interesting moments of the festival. The event will be recorded next year as well. The edited video clip of 2014 will also be released soon. As to the photo contest, it is expected to be held annually with more nominations and awards.
We hope that next year’s New Wine Festival will expand even more and become more diverse and that the wine lovers will be able to taste higher quality wines as well. After all, it is wine that is the essence of the whole story.
© Georgian Wine Club/vinoge.com
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