Wildlife Photography
7 March – 4 April 2004
Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2003
The “Wildlife Photography” exhibition is the aftermath of an international competition organized by BBC Wildlife Magazine and The Natural History Museum in London.
The 40th edition of the annual contest, which selects the best wildlife photographs in several categories, took place in 2003. The selection was made from more than 20,000 photographs submitted by 1,750 artists representing 60 countries.
The works of award and honorable mention winners make up this extraordinary exhibition.Photographing nature, extremely difficult due to its variability and unpredictability, requires extraordinary patience, knowledge of the subject and professionalism from the camera operator. As a result, works can be created that are a reporter’s document of a world that is inaccessible on a daily basis, and often already disappearing from the face of the earth, astonishing in their undoubted artistry. Fascinating photographic encounters with the world of plants and animals in the desert and the jungle, in the airy skies and the ocean abyss, in the light of day and the glare of night are captured on color film.
The opportunity to view these photographs provides an opportunity not only to commune with the undoubted beauty, but also has an educational value and contributes to thinking about the need to take care of its future.
The best photograph in the category “The world in our hands” immortalizes “humanely” thoughtful, gazing into the distance gorilla, which in a way personifies the disappearing wildlife. The whole composition is complemented by the figure of a small boy emerging from the darkness, and the mood of the captured moment is built by the excellent distribution of light and shadow.
Technical perfection can be admired in the presentation of familiar-looking storks, sleeping in nests built, not on Polish thatched roofs, but Spanish rocks, against a background of stars moving across the night sky.
The swan hovering over the pristine surface of the water in pursuit of its rival is an image of the dynamism and power of nature frozen in the frame in a wonderful halo of pink colors. To achieve this effect, the author spent several hours immersed in the icy water.
The stately carriage turtle moving among the undersea rocks, against the backdrop of sunlight breaking through the surface, introduces the viewer to the unknown and fascinating world of the Mediterranean depths.
The fact that the artist’s keen sense and sense of observation can lead to the unexpected effect of creating a work of art when photographing seemingly mundane scenery is evidenced by a photo taken by David W. Breed from W. Britain (Composition and Form category).
It shows the lapping of hyena paws on a cracked, muddy slurry, solidified like prehistoric lava at the time of the creation of the universe. Created by nature, the fantastic lines in beige and brown color tones are vividly reminiscent of the cave drawings of our ancient ancestors.
The exhibition includes 90 award-winning and honorable mention photographs, and each of them is a separate, extraordinary truth about the world of wild nature, captured through the lens of one of 77 authors representing 17 countries, around which one can weave a never-ending story about the mysterious beauty and fascinating harmony of this world
