Premio Happiness ONTHEMOVE

The great Italian comic actor Antonio De Curtis, stage-name Totò, said that making people laugh is far more difficult than making them cry. Transferring this concept to photography one could say that the portrayal of drama, suffering or tragedy is easier than portraying happiness.
On this premise, our Happiness ONTHEMOVE prize was introduced to the festival as the in-house competition in partnership with Consorzio Vino Chianti (Chianti wine producers' consortium) and with the media partnership of Pagina99.
For this contest, all photographers are charged with the task of documenting happiness, the joy of life and the beauty that surrounds us while boldly challenging the old truism, which claims "no news is good news".
It's not by pure chance that we talk about extreme challenges.
In this image-obsessed, social-media age we have created, happiness has been devalued to a mere platitude. A sort of contrived theatrical, or situational comedy depicting the subject of the 'selfie' during a snatched moment of false euphoria to be flashed before their 'friends' (and perfect strangers), thereby reducing the concept to a purely superficial dimension in an endlessly repeatable series of clichés.
The challenge of Happiness ONTHEMOVE is to find stories that explore the deeper aspects of happiness. Everyday stories. Stories that at first glance seem quite ordinary, but which nevertheless make us smile and give us glimpses of the realistic happiness of life: not always easy, not always visible. Above all - never banal.