ORF's brand Universum awarded at the NaturVision Festival

ORF's blue-chip brand Universum has won the NaturVision Camera Award for Michael Schlamberger's documentary "The Return of the Aurochs" at NaturVision Festival in Ludwigsburg, The title is a co-production by ScienceVision, ORF and ARTE funded by the Austrian Film Fund and VAM in cooperation with ORF-Enterprise.

The jury's statement: "They seem to be at rest within themselves, while bursting with power. Their appearance has always influenced our spirituality: The awe-inspiring cave paintings of our ancestors leave us in no doubt about this. The aurochs have a great effect on their habitat, they shape whole landscapes. All this can be wordlessly conveyed by the breathtaking camera work and image composition of this documentary. The gentle tranquility in the images, the conveyed power and a masterful play with light come from one cast. The images carry us from the big picture to the smallest detail and back again. The camerawork and image design shapes and carries the film with a congruent and diverse aesthetic. In doing so, it creates its own level of storytelling: the images have a profound effect and bring the viewer tangibly close to the aurochs - perhaps as close as they once were to our ancestors."

The documentary "The Return of the Aurochs" (52 min) is distributed worldwide by ORF-Enterprise, and it's an ambitious attempt to bring one of Europe's largest terrestrial animals back to life: the aurochs. The return of this majestic species of wild cattle is part of a much greater story - of allowing wilderness back into Europe.

The NaturVision Festival launched in 2002 in Neuschönau in the Bavarian Forest, and is held in Ludwigsburg in the German state of Baden-Württemberg since 2012.