Duty

Dr. Juliana Ribeiro has just taken off her protective gear for lunch, after 8 hours of continuous work in the Covid-19 emergency room. Clear signs of prolonged and repeated use of this type of equipment appear on her face. Her features reflect great effort and extreme fatigue due to the human commitment to her moral duty.

What grabs you is the hint of sadness in her face as she feels the pain for humanity, as deaths in Brazil exceeded half a million people due to the pandemic. This photo was taken at the University Hospital Clementino Fraga Velho in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Hugs to Survive

85 year old Rosa Luzia Lonardi is hugged by nurse Adriana Silva da Costa Souza; the first hug Rosa has received in five months. In March 2020, nursing homes across Brazil closed their doors to all visitors, preventing millions from visiting elderly relatives, as authorities instructed to reduce physical contact to a minimum. But in Viva Beam, an old house outside São Paulo, a new simple innovation called the 'hug curtain' was allowed where people could see and hug their loved ones without risking their lives.

For those without visitors, volunteers and staff provided that humanitarian support. As they say at Viva Beam, "Everyone deserves a good hug".

Embrace

During the COVID-19 pandemic, most of the world's population experienced the pain of being away from their loved ones. However, the extent of the psychological impact inflicted on healthcare workers was more profound.

Not only are they exposed to the front line experiencing first hand the devesation of the pandemic, and exposed to the danger of the virus, but they are unable to go home and be reunited with their loved ones; especially their children! It is a story that touches the hearts of hearts and expresses with great eloquence 'humanity'.

Blast Scars

August 6, 2020 - the port. In the aftermath of the Beirut explosion, an injured truck driver stands inside the port, at the same location where he was at the moment of the explosion two days ago.

Despite the massive destruction and the large number of dead and wounded, this driver was lucky enough to live and witness another day.

High Hopes

A group of lifeguards tries to rescue the passengers of a sinking ship in the Mediterranean Sea, although the day is coming to an end and in the bitter cold, the rescue team did not stop until the end.

Rescue

An elephant drowns in deep water as villagers gather to rescue it near a village in West Bengal, India.

Melting Gold

The unique exterior, with its golden sun-like architecture, melts into this photo I took of a building located in Incheon, South Korea.

Playful Moon

A creative fragmentation of the Burj Khalifa, in which the moon appears as if it is trying to hide behind the most famous tower in the world.

The Eye

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, before creating light. And when God created light, he also created darkness; giving beauty infinite dimensions.

Spiral

A unique perspective of the hotel lobby in the Jin Mao Tower in Shanghai. What appears as a regular spiral reflects the splendor that is architecture that impacts on our human senses.

Eye in the Sky

The 'Eye of Dubai' embraced by the fog. The fog season inspires the photographer's lens in Dubai. The aesthetic harmony it creates with tall buildings and structures is breathtaking.

Camille

This beautiful eleven-year-old girl sat looking at the lens that caught her one look, but the number of translations emanating from her eyes.. was too many to count!

Sanctuary

Svalbard - Norway, August 2020. As the sea ice melts, the polar bear is drifting on a tiny sliver of ice into the open ocean. A future full of possibilities.

The Social Distance

A concert before the COVID19 pandemic. A famous Italian poet, Giuseppe Ungaretti, said that poetry contains itself a mystery, poetry cannot be called poetry if it does not communicate this sense of mystery. For me, photography, as for other forms of art, is above all this.

Therefore, describing a mystery is not possible. The photographer, however, wants to share their emotions through an image, hoping that it can arouse the same feeling in others.

Solitude

An old grandmother lives in her hut made of cardboard and second-hand items, feeding off leftovers in the trash. She is alone, accompanied only by a spider nearby.

Visitor From Above

A Weasel playing on a pine tree trunk in the jungles of Yogyakarta - Java Island, Indonesia.

Above The Polar Regions

The Arctic and Antarctica are both facing a range of quick changes. These regions are clearly challenging places to live, and the few animals that make it their home have adapted to face the extreme winter conditions.

This series reveals and celebrates from an aerial point of view, the beauty of the incredible frozen landscapes and the wildlife living at the edge of the ice. Powerful yet fragile.

Trashumance

Trashumance is to be in continuous movement. A thousand-year-old practice, a type of pastoralism or nomadism, a seasonal movement of livestock between fixed Summer and Winter pastures.

This portfolio provides a visual narrative to the transhumant livestock that is practiced in the province of Jaén Spain. It is one of the last redoubts of the Iberian Peninsula where transhumance still exists, but with the sensation of witnessing the disappearance of a way of life.

A Covid-19 Narrative

Since the Second World War, we have not encountered such horrific events as the ones we are experiencing now. It is as if we have become characters in a science fiction film. Countries have closed their borders, the economy is hit hard, and people are confined to their homes.

However, the greatest impact was felt in the hospitals. Like any photographer, I am compelled to capture such moments regardless of the circumstances and risks. I am married and have two children so it was not an easy decision to enter a COVID19 intensive care unit, but I knew even though I couldn't change history I could record it.

I spent 29 days in intensive care, and experienced not only difficult moments but heart-felt moments. I wanted to also make sure to capture the aesthetics in documentary photography, albeit difficult. The way to do that is to be invisible and not in rush. That's what I saw.

Pareidolia

Pareidolia is the tendency for incorrect perception of a stimulus as an object, pattern or meaning known to the observer, such as seeing shapes in clouds, seeing faces in inanimate objects or abstract patterns. The shown collection attempts to find faces with unique characteristics under the microscope & within a tiny area that barely can be seen.

The Strength Of The Artsakh

Over the centuries, the cycle of bloodshed and displacement was repeated in the hills and forests of Nagorno-Karabakh. A sustainable peace remains elusive.

The bitter rivalry between the two countries continues with the memories of the Azerbaijani soldiers who remember since childhood the days when the Armenians expelled them from their homes, and in the hearts of the Armenian children who may now dream of what the Azerbaijani fighters dreamed of thirty years ago.

Randy Olson is a photographer in the documentary tradition. He often works with his wife, Melissa Farlow and their work has taken them to over 50 countries in the past 30 years. Even though they are published in LIFE, GEO, Smithsonian and other magazines, they have primarily worked on projects for the National Geographic Society. They normally work individually, but have co-produced National Geographic magazine stories on northern California, American National Parks, and the Alps. They photographed the southern United States for a book by Collins Publishing and have collaborated on over 70 books by various publishers.

Randy’s 30+ National Geographic projects have taken him to almost every continent. The National Geographic Society published a book of his work in 2011 in the Masters of Photography series. Olson was the Magazine Photographer of the Year in the Pictures of the Year International (POYi) competition, and was also awarded POYi’s Newspaper Photographer of the Year—one of only two photographers to win in both media in the largest photojournalism contest operating continuously since World War II. Randy is also the recipient of the Siena International Photo Awards (SIPA) Photographer of the Year and the HIPA Photography Appreciation Award.

In 2011, Randy founded The Photo Society (thephotosociety.org). The purpose of the organization is to provide exposure to members as the economics of print dwindles. The National Geographic photographers elected Randy to represent them on the Photographer’s Advisory Board (PAB) - a group that represents the photographers in contract negotiations with National Geographic. During his tenure, the PAB successfully rebuffed National Geographic's attempt to take the photographer's copyright away from them. And The Photo Society was born as a result of the need for photographers to stand together for their own survival.

While working as a newspaper photographer at The Pittsburgh Press, Olson received an Alicia Patterson Foundation Fellowship in 1995 to support a seven-year project documenting a family with AIDS, and a first place Robert F. Kennedy Award for his story on problems with Section 8 housing in 1991. He was also awarded the Nikon Sabbatical grant and a grant from the National Archives to save the Pictures of the Year collection.

As the economics of print dwindles they support their documentary work by doing advertising campaigns and corporate work. Randy photographed the Toyota Land Cruiser campaign in the Yukon and Australia. They have done advertising photography for Becton Dickinson, HSBC Bank, Audi, Cleveland Clinic, Stratos Global and others so they can continue to support socially responsible documentary projects. They live in Pennsylvania and Oregon.

One day in her senior year of high school, Cristina Mittermeier sat on the floor with her classmates listening to a man talk about career opportunities in marine sciences while she looked up, transfixed, at the otherworldly images he showed on a screen. She knew right then that she wanted a career focused on the ocean. But her hometown of Cuernavaca, in central Mexico, was nowhere near the water, and there were no female scientists around who could offer her guidance. Her father wanted her to be an accountant, like him. Her grandmother wanted her to find a husband. Her mother, a psychologist, told her she should follow her dream.

Mittermeier is now one of the most influential female photographers in the world. She began her career as a Marine Biologist working in her native Mexico. She soon discovered that she could better advocate for the oceans and the planet through the lens of her camera than she could with data on spreadsheets.

Today, a virtuous mind and voice in conservation photography, Mittermeier is the co-founder of the conservation society ‘SeaLegacy’, a National Geographic contributing photographer, a Sony Artisan of Imagery and the editor of 26 coffee table books on conservation issues. She is the first female photographer to reach 1 million followers on Instagram and was a 2018 National Geographic Adventurer of the Year. Mittermeier is acknowledged as one of the most Influential Women in Ocean Conservation in 2018 by Ocean Geographic, and The Men’s Journal recently named her as one of the 18 Most Adventurous Women in the World.

Mittermeier has worked in more than 120 countries on every continent in the world. Her work is about building a greater awareness of the responsibility of what it means to be a human. Her work relays an understanding that we are inextricably linked to all other species on this planet and that we have a duty to act as the keepers of our fellow life forms. Mittermeier lives in Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.

The International League of Conservation Photographers (iLCP) is a U.S.-based nonprofit whose mission is to support environmental and cultural conservation through ethical photography and filmmaking. Since the organization's founding in 2005, iLCP’s members have participated in over 50 expeditions, resulting in over 10,000 images and countless stories. Through solution-based storytelling, iLCP expeditions have resulted in significant conservation impact.

Our programs are built on the participation and contributions of our Fellows, a group of professional wildlife, nature, and cultural visual storytellers who, in addition to displaying remarkable photographic and filmmaking skills, have each demonstrated a deep commitment to conservation efforts around the globe. iLCP Fellows work doesn’t end with content creation. We work with the Fellowship to share photos and films with politicians and changemakers; publish articles in major outlets and social media channels to raise awareness of the issues; and collaborate with conservation groups to work towards viable solutions - relentlessly working for conservation knowing that an impactful image can often bring about change.