See the winning photos of the 14th All Gujarat Photography Competition themed ‘Street Life’

Have a look at the best photos from Manav Pratishthan’s annual competition, selected from a whopping 900 entries. Drop by for the last day of the exhibition at Ravishankar Raval Kala Bhavan, today until 8 PM. 

“The most unique street life picture is the one in which the photographer captures the energy of the commotion on the street, and not the people suffering from poverty, to increase the catharsis in the frame,”explained juror Vinay Panjwani, a senior photographer who had the arduous task of sifting through 900 entries to select the winners of the 14th All Gujarat Photography Exhibition. Organised by Manav Pratishthan, this year’s theme was ‘Street Life’ in monochrome.

Organised at Ravishankar Raval Kala Bhavan during the rainy evening hours of August 17, the show not only features the six best works, but also the photographs of the other shortlisted candidates who have delivered glimpses of considerable aesthetic value. This year, more than 300 enthusiastic applicants from around Gujarat participated in the competition. The 1^st,2^ndand 3^rdprizes were awarded to Jyotik Bhachech (Ahmedabad), Vishnu Raval (Anand) and Ketan Farsrami (Vadodara), respectively. The three Commendable Prize winners, who received Rs. 1000/- as prizes, are Khayal Dave (Ahmedabad), Amit Suvera (Ahmedabad) and Meet Dharsandia (Jamjodhpur). The total cash prizes amounted to Rs 20,000.

Manav Pratishthan, which is perhaps Gujarat’s oldest photography competition, aims to motivate people to consider photography as an art. Most of the people who applied to the competition, in fact, are not professional photographers. Even the first prize winner, Jyotik Bhachech, is a psychiatrist by profession. Bhachechhas captured a thought-provoking composition along the Sabarmati Riverfront, which won him Rs 7000 as well as the Drishti Trophy 2018. He explained the beauty of monochrome, “A monochromatic street photograph is timeless because the onlooker, who doesn’t know the story behind clicking it, will always remain mystified about the scene’s real-time textures.”

Ketan Modi, who is a veteran photographer and a photography teacher from the city and the Managing Trustee of Manav Pratishthan, shared,”From this year, we are also starting the Manav Pratishthan scholarship, through which photographers who are working on the visual documentation of Gujarat’s culture, heritage and traditional arts will be given a sum of Rs 25,000/- and their works will be published in a separate literature each year.”

The exhibition will remain open until August 20, from 12:00 PM to 8:00 PM. Manav Pratishthan will release its 15th edition of the popular competition around the time of World Photography Day again next year, which falls on August 19. To catch sight of important information about it, keep a look out on creativeyatra.com.