R) First prize winner Ayesha Azhar, second prize winner Salman Alkhshali, Public Affairs Officer Jeffrey Hills, Information Officer Amanda Hicks and third prize winner Saleh Abbas. (Courtesy photo)JEDDAH: The US Consulate in Jeddah launched its very first photography contest this year on Feb. 9 under the theme “Children – Faces of the Future”. The contest, open to those between ages of 16 and 50, culminated in the selection of three winners who were invited to an awards distribution ceremony at the consulate, Tuesday. Contestants were asked to submit a photograph “capturing a memorable moment in a child's life” as well as a brief explanation of the image. Public Affairs Officer Jeffrey Hills, Information Officer Amanda Hicks and Information Resource Assistant Layal Zok met the winners and discussed their photographs, the relevance of photography as a medium of expression as well as a number of social and cultural topics. “We were really impressed with the diversity and aesthetic quality of the entries,” Hills said at the gathering. “The photos reflected the wonderful diversity of children's talents.” He added that the contest was inspired by Michelle Obama's, wife of President Barack Obama, commitment and efforts to improve the lives of children across the world. The contest was won by Ayesha Azhar with student Salman Alkhshali and Saleh Abbas as the first and second runners-up respectively. Azhar's depiction of a young boy dressed in traditional Pakistani attire playing cricket outside the Badshahi Mosque in Lahore, Pakistan, received the most votes by the consulate's employees while Alkhshali's close-up of a Pakistani-Thai expatriate boy enjoying cake and Abbas' nine-year-old picture of his daughter Jude – who is now 10 – splashing in the bath, also were popular in the contest. All three photographs will now be displayed in the consulate as part of its permanent art collection, said Hicks. The three winners are amateur photographers, though Azhar is an architect by profession and Alkhshali is hoping to pursue a degree in filmmaking. Second runner-up Abbas said the picture he took of his daughter was in 2002, with one of the very first digital cameras in the market. Alkhshali, on the other hand, enjoys treating photography as a challenge. “Photography, for me, is freezing a great moment, while film is creating a great moment,” he remarked. Azhar told Saudi Gazette that she felt compelled to take the picture of the boy after she observed the almost “aggressive” expression on his face during the game. “With this child, there was a hunger, an eagerness to achieve. His attitude compelled me to take his picture. That kind of spunk showed that a child does not necessarily need education to define his path to success,” she said.
