he Polar Bear Award for 1999 was presented to the organisers of the 2nd World Lesbian and Gay Cultural Conferences on gay and lesbian culture to be held in Rio de Janeiro (July 8 -11, 1999) and Lisbon (November 17-21, 1999).

The award, given by the Nordic organization of lesbian and gay cultural workers, Tupilak, was announced during this year's Berlin international film festival - the birthplace of the Polar Bear Award, which was inspired by the Berlinale's own gay and lesbian Teddy Bear awards.

The award was presented last year during the 1st World Conference on Lesbian & Gay Culture in Stockholm (July 1998) - to the 1st international homo cultural festival in Greece - to be centred around the bomb-threatened drama production, "Lesbian Blues".

Earlier Polar Bears have gone to the late German film distributor, Manfred Salzgeber, the pioneering American film director, Barbara Hammer and the pioneering organizers of the first-ever international lesbian and gay film festivals in Reykjavik, Iceland, Tallinn, Estonia and Riga, Latvia.

The Polar Bear-recipient, the first homo film and cultural festival in Romania (where lesbian and gay relations are still outlawed and a gay journalist was recently murdered), was stopped by armed police with dogs in Bucharest.

The award was accepted the Portugese artist Celso Junior, also organiser of the Lisbon gay and lesbian film festival (September 99) and the 2nd world gay and lesbian conference (November 17 - 21 1999).

Colin de la Motte-Sherman