Nairobi, 12 August 2010
- It was a simple game of building blocks
that inspired Coco TIN Chi Ting's world-beating
painting. Today, on the
United Nations International Youth Day,
the 14-year-old from Hong Kong, China, was
announced the global winner of the United
Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) 19th
International Children's Painting Competition,
beating off stiff competition from hundreds
of thousands of other children from across
the world.
Coco said her winning
painting was a warning about pollution and
its effect on animals.
As the overall winner,
she receives US$2,000 in prize money and
an all-expenses-paid trip in October to
the Tunza International Children's Conference
in Nagoya, Japan, where she will formally
receive her award.
The second global winner
is 11-year-old Katherine Liu from the United
States. She, along with six other regional
winners, will receive US$1,000 and a trip
to the Tunza conference in Japan.
"In my picture,
a variety of animals are carved into blocks
and on top perches a fragile glass Earth",
explains Coco. "As the evil hand made
of pollution tries to take blocks and destroy
the tower, the good hand comes in and stops
it. By doing this, the tower of blocks is
saved, and the glass Earth stays intact.
This shows that if we don't act now and
protect the animals, the Earth will be shattered
and destroyed."
The theme of this year's
competition was Biodiversity: Connecting
with Nature and the young artists - all
between 6 and 14 years old - took on the
challenge with impressive artistic flair.
Images of giraffes and penguins aboard a
steam train named the 'Green City Express',
trees bursting with exotic birds and animals
and a colourful cascade of wildlife emerging
from planet Earth are among the winning
paintings.
The painting competition
is jointly organised by the United Nations
Environment Programme (UNEP), the Japan-based
Foundation for Global Peace and Environment
(FGPE), Bayer and Nikon. It has been held
every year since 1991 and, in that time,
has received over 3 million entries from
children in over 100 countries. This year,
there were 594,032 entries received from
95 countries.
"Children's artworks
attract us with their cheerful expression
of nature and ecosystems", said Tomoko
Yano, Secretary General of the Foundation
for Global Peace and Environment (FGPE).
"On the other hand, they show the suffering
of creatures living in a polluted sea or
a depleting forest as their own pain. They
show us that human beings are just one species
among millions of others. We hope the children's
artwork will strike a chord with many more
people around the world and encourage them
to take actions for future generations."
Each UNEP Regional Office
(Bahrain, Bangkok, Geneva, Panama City,
Washington DC, and Nairobi) chose their
own regional winners and submitted 1,629
paintings to the final selection stage of
the competition.
The regional winners
were: Hanna Gall, 12, (Europe), Enrique
Suárez Estrada, 11, (Latin America
and the Caribbean), Sylvia Gong, 14, (North
America), Charlotte Petra Sakura Chalkley,
12, (West Asia), Gowtham Vigneshwar, 11
(Africa) and Wigavee Rattamanee, 9 (Asia
Pacific).
"Once again, we
are very proud of the increasing number
of entries for our painting competition
- a core element of our partnership with
UNEP", said Michael Schade, Senior
Vice President at Bayer. "The children's
paintings are fascinating artworks with
a very clear message to all of us: Care
about this planet! We must take the concerns
and wishes of the many children from all
over the world very seriously. I would encourage
everybody to have a look at these impressive
paintings".
Yoshimichi Kawai, Director,
Member of the Board and Executive Officer
at Nikon Corporation said the paintings
also carried a serious message. "The
rate of biodiversity loss has been increasing
day by day and it is very important that
people around the world understand and share
this problem", said Mr. Kawai. "Nikon
wants to appeal, together with the partners,
on the importance of conservation of biodiversity
to people through the children's paintings,
and hope they will start taking an action
to save biodiversity."
The award ceremony for
the International Children's Painting Competition
will be one of the key events at UNEP's
Tunza International Children and Youth Conference,
which will bring together more than 105
children from 35 countries from 20 - 26
October 2010 in Nagoya, Japan.
A selection of winning
paintings will be displayed during the conference
before touring various exhibitions around
the world. The paintings will also be exhibited
on the Tunza website and will be used for
posters, postcards, calendars, and other
UNEP materials to raise awareness of biodiversity
issues.
UNEP's Tunza programme
- named after a Swahili word meaning to
"treat with care" - aims to increase
young people's involvement in environmental
issues through environmental activities,
workshops and conferences.
Now that this year's
painting competition winners have been announced,
the search for 2011's best young artists
has already begun. 2011 will be the 20th
edition of the International Children's
Painting Competition. To mark the UN's International
Year of Forests in 2011, the theme of next
year's painting competition will be 'Life
in the Forests' and participants will have
until 15 April 2011 to submit their entries.
The winning paintings
can be viewed here: http://unep.org/tunza/children/19_Gallery_Main.asp
