United Bulgarian Bank is a prize-winner at the prestigious contest BAPRA Bright Awards 2017: Night of Bright Ideas, organized by the Bulgarian Association of PR agencies. The award falls within the category Campaign, conducted by an in-house PR division and is given in recognition of the UN/NOTED project. The latter is dedicated to the Gold Fund of UBB’s Collection, involving series of exhibitions, showcasing 47 paintings, owned by the Bank, all non-displayed artworks of renowned 20^th-century artists.

The award ceremony took place on 27 April 2017 in Rainbow Plaza Hotel, Sofia city. The distinguished contest, held for 8^th consecutive year, featured over 120 projects. Despite that the focus of the contest was on the achievements of Bulgarian PR agencies, the category in which UBB won a bronze prize, namely Campaign, conducted by an in-house PR division, had been exclusively created to honor projects that saw light owing to the efforts of the in-house PR units of the nine contesting companies. It had been exactly through UBB endeavours that UN/NOTED shined in the so called Night of Bright Ideas. 

The award honored the Bank’s PR team and all officials, who had contributed to preserving this art treasure of ours throughout the years and exhibiting it to wider public today.

Moreover, UN/NOTED artworks from UBB’S GOLD FUND might not have been let into daylight without the confidence and faith of UBB’s management, having entrusted us with the most emotional project – the entire collection of paintings and valuable antiques, possessed by the Bank.  

I would like to additionally express my gratitude to BAPRA for having this contest category available, which serves as a testimony to us, clients, of the association’s belief that in the PR sphere work is being equally shared between an agency and its client. Hence, along this line of thought, even though the idea behind UN/NOTED spurred in-house, it would not have become public without the efforts and support of our PR agency – М3 Communications Group – Ms. Anka Kostova, PR Manager at UBB shared.

The UN/NOTED Project, presenting the Gold Fund of UBB’s Collection, received recognition for its untraditional approach and efficiency by the contest’s international jury, involving leading PR experts with long-standing global experience.   

Although the UN/NOTED exposition series have still a way to go around Bulgarian towns and cities, the Bank’s efforts have already been highly esteemed.

„This is not just a PR campaign for us. Above all it is a desire to have the history of Bulgarian culture and arts, and specifically the works of history-makers, whose pieces, however, have stayed in the shadow, revealed to a wider public. We believe that art does not belong to vaults, but to Bulgarian galleries countrywide, where values are being affirmed and love of arts is being spurred to flourish”, Ms. Kostova added.      

Some of the efforts, invested in the paintings’ popularization, also involved the creation of a dedicated promotional site for the Collection – www.ubbcollection.bg - featuring sections, representing the pieces of UBB’s Gold Fund, valuable antiques from the Bank’s Collection, as well as all recent news, linked to occurring exhibitions in the country.

The UN/NOTED part of UBB’s Gold Fund Collection candidature at BAPRA Bright Awards 2017 has been posted on the contest’s website.

See video from the official opening of a key exposition of ours, being also the first one for 2017, held at Dvoretsa National Art Gallery, Sofia city, uploaded in our official YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NlQ3eP-k-0Y.