The 15th annual International Underwater Image Festival Marmara welcomes the professional underwater photographers and everyone who’s interested in the wondrous world of the Marmara Sea.
This year's festival, organized with the support of the International Information Agency Sputnik and the Turkey Divers Club, is being held from September 4 until September 13 at the Haydarpasa Terminus in Istanbul, and is dedicated to the memory of Kemal Gokhan Ture, a prominent underwater photographer.
The festival has grown from an environmental movement founded by a group of Turkish divers who wanted to raise awareness about the pollution of the Marmara Sea. Eventually the movement transformed into a video and photography contest aimed at highlighting the beauty of the sea depths and marine environmental issues.
The participants of about 100 contests held during the festival include Turkish and foreign photographers, acclaimed environmental activists and divers, directors of full-length and scientific films, researchers and scientists.
Osman Urper, chairman of the festival’s organizing committee, told Sputnik about how the event was originally established.
"One day the divers from our club started coming across various garbage at the bottom of the Marmara Sea – plastic bottles, car tires… The club’s chairman was shocked by these discoveries and asked us to help clean up the sea floor. However, many club members didn’t like this, arguing that they’re divers, not janitors. After a while, the club leadership came up with an idea to hold a contest: whoever retrieved some debris from the sea floor was to be awarded with a cup and some prizes. The next year the contest was expanded as the participants started filming and photographing things that they were discovering in the sea depths. Eventually, instead of filming just the marine litter, the participants turned their attention to the beauty of the sea depths and the marine life. The contest was originally named "Marmara Sea. Beauty In Spite of Litter." And that’s how a contest born out of a litter collection initiative became an international festival."
The participants of the festival visit various photo exhibitions, take part in seminars and roundtable discussions, and debate on social projects aimed at protection of the marine environment.
There are also to international contests held within the festivals' framework. One of them is dedicated to the photographs shot in the sea depths across the world, while the other is solely a contest of pictures taken on the bottom of the Marmara Sea. The winners of both contests are determined by a jury, as well as a popular vote held on the festival’s official Facebook page.
Also, since 2013 people who distinguished themselves in the field of marine environment protection are presented with the Friend of the Sea award at the festival.
This year’s festival was sponsored by the municipal government of the Kadikoy district, many companies dedicated to the protection of marine ecology like Hunstman
Pürsan Chemials and Сhimsa ve Enerjisa, nonprofit organizations, universities and activists. More detailed information about the event can be obtained at the festival’s official website — http://www.marmarafestival.org/
During the festival, a flag of the event’s official media sponsor, the International Information Agency Sputnik, it to be planted at the bottom of the Bosphorus strait.
