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Oh, baby, baby, it’s a wild world, and few people know that better than the photographers nominated for the Natural History Museum’s Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition and prize. This year’s commended photographers have just been announced ahead of the exhibition opening in October, and they are the usual mix of stunning natural beauty and powerfully emotive calls to action.
Highlights include a sprinting giraffe, a very relaxed polar bear, a dreamy cloud of perch and two jousting dipper birds – images of nature at its most beautiful and full of wonder. It’s the good stuff: the images you want and expect from a prize like this. But humanity’s catastrophic impact on the planet is on view too, with heart-wrenching images of overfishing, mink farms and droughts. That’s what’s so good, and important, about this prize: the combination of awe and heartache, beauty and sadness. You can’t just celebrate how lovely the planet is if you’re also destroying that very same thing.
The show opens on October 14 and the winners are announced on October 11, Until then, take a look at a small selection of the works that will be on display.
‘Wildlife Photographer of the Year’ opens Oct 14 at the Natural History Museum.
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