Photography and film festival award winners announced for Sport and Society Conference

Facebook / Tweet

From St. Norbert College, June 1, 2010
by Mike Counter, mike.counter@snc.edu, (920) 403-3089

The Vincent Awards, named after the legendary Green Bay Packers coach Vince Lombardi, were handed out tonight as part of the photography and film festival awards ceremony at Lambeau Field for the conference, "A Mirror of Our Culture: Sport and Society in America," co-hosted by the Green Bay Packers and St. Norbert College.

The photography winners were Mike Roemer, first place, with his photo titled "Breaking up Is Hard to Do," and runner-up Evan Siegle, with "Homecoming Victory."

Roemer, a commercial and editorial photographer based in Green Bay, Wis., travels around the U.S. and internationally to shoot for clients. After a 10-year stint in daily newspapers, Roemer returned to Green Bay in the mid-1990's to start his own business, Mike Roemer Photography, Inc.

Siegle has been a staff photographer at the Green Bay Press Gazette since 2002. His duties include shooting photos for all sections of the newspaper, including Green Bay Packers home and road games. In 2006, Siegle covered the Torino Winter Games in Italy for Gannett newspapers.

The photography competition was judged by the St. Norbert College art faculty.

Two more Vincent Awards were handed out to film winners. First place went to the film "Ghost Player: Relive the Magic." In 1989, Hollywood went to Iowa to shoot "Field of Dreams." The blockbuster movie spawned a comedic baseball show starring local ballplayers that would have an 18-year run and travel the world. "Ghost Player" tells the story of how the team entertained and moved audiences and changed the players' lives forever.

Second place went to "Truth in 24," chronicling the Audi sport racing team's attempt to win a record fifth consecutive 24 Hours of Le Mans. The film gives viewers an unprecedented behind-the-scenes view of the strategies engineers and drivers used as they set out to make history against local favorite, Team Peugeot.

The film festival was judged by Tim Meyer, professor of communications at the University of Wisconsin -- Green Bay; Michael Marsden, dean of St. Norbert College and academic vice president; Brian Pirman, associate professor of art at St. Norbert College; Kevin Quinn, director of the conference and professor of economics at St. Norbert College; and Mike Counter, director of media relations at St. Norbert College.

Created to celebrate both the region's rich sports tradition and the excellence with which Coach Lombardi's name is synonymous, the Vincent Award features a medallion cast in bronze and set in a crystal stand. The Palma Vincentiana, as the medallion is known, depicts Coach Lombardi in profile, wearing a laurel crown. The reverse features a well-known and characteristically direct Lombardi quote, translated into the Latin: Quod nefas ibi accidit, or "What the hell is going on out here?"

The medallion, produced with the permission of the Lombardi family, was designed collaboratively by Professor William Bohn