Sony World Photography Awards 2025 Captures Nature Staged For Human Indulgence

Image © Zed Nelson, United Kingdom, Photographer of the Year, Professional competition, Wildlife & Nature, Sony World Photography Awards 2025, featured with permission

We build nature reserves, zoo habitats, and museum dioramas—only to realize we’re constructing nostalgia. This year’s Sony World Photography Awards recognizes British photographer Zed Nelson for capturing that irony. His award-winning project, The Anthropocene Illusion, holds a mirror up to our manicured versions of the wild, and the gap they reveal.

Nelson’s winning series spans four continents and documents the spaces humans have built to simulate connection with nature. These man-made experiences in safari parks, botanical gardens, and more, while designed to educate or entertain, offer a dissonant mirror to our ongoing environmental impact.

Image © Zed Nelson, United Kingdom, Photographer of the Year, Professional competition, Wildlife & Nature, Sony World Photography Awards 2025, featured with permission 

Through images that blur the line between authentic and artificial nature, Nelson explores the contradiction of a species homesick for the wilderness it continues to dismantle.

Announced at a ceremony in London on April 18, the accolade comes with a US$25,000 prize, a suite of Sony gear, and the opportunity to exhibit new work at next year’s show. The jury, chaired by Monica Allende, praised Nelson’s ability to turn a sprawling, urgent issue into a visual narrative that invites viewers to reconsider their role in the ecological story.

“The Anthropocene Illusion illustrates a world where the boundaries between the real and the artificial blur, where the wild survives in controlled enclosures, and where human nostalgia for nature is expressed through spectacle rather than action,” expressed Allende. “Nelson’s work compels viewers to question their own role in this paradox and consider the consequences of a society increasingly distanced from the natural world. This timely body of work tells one of the most important stories of our age, and is now more critical than ever.”

Image © Zed Nelson, United Kingdom, Photographer of the Year, Professional competition, Wildlife & Nature, Sony World Photography Awards 2025, featured with permission

In this rare instance, art doesn’t merely depict climate change—it implicates us. Nelson was also the winner of the Wildlife & Nature category, doubling down on the thematic potency of his work.

The ceremony also uplifted outstanding work across student and youth categories. For one, Peru’s Micaela Valdivia Medina was named Student Photographer of the Year for her powerful visual study of women in Chilean prisons.

Image © Micaela Valdivia Medina, Peru, Student Photographer of the Year, Student Competition, Sony World Photography Awards 2025, featured with permission

Medina shared that having her images commended is not just a milestone for her, “but also [for] all the women I worked with for this project.”

Image © Micaela Valdivia Medina, Peru, Student Photographer of the Year, Student Competition, Sony World Photography Awards 2025, featured with permission

She added: “To talk about and photograph prison spaces is never easy, but it is necessary to keep making and sharing these images. As a student, I appreciate this opportunity and recognition. At this time when photography and arts education is in decline, I think it’s important that students, teachers and professional photographers unite to protect it.”

Image © Micaela Valdivia Medina, Peru, Student Photographer of the Year, Student Competition, Sony World Photography Awards 2025, featured with permission

Meanwhile, 16-year-old Daniel Dian-Ji Wu of Taiwan took Youth Photographer of the Year for a striking silhouette of a skateboarder at sunset.

Image © Daniel Dian-Ji Wu, Taiwan, Youth Photographer of the Year, Youth Competition, Sony World Photography Awards 2025, featured with permission

France’s Olivier Unia won the Open Photographer of the Year for a single-shot capture of a rider mid-fall during a traditional Moroccan tbourida, distilling tension, tradition, and beauty in a single frame.

Image © Olivier Unia, France, Open Photographer of the Year, Open Competition, Motion, Sony World Photography Awards 2025, featured with permission

Other professional category winners this year include Toby Binder for his intimate documentation of Belfast’s divided youth, Ulana Switucha’s architectural series on Tokyo’s public toilets, and Gui Christ’s vibrant portrait project exploring Afro-Brazilian spirituality. For the first time, winners were also invited to Insights, a behind-the-scenes day of mentorship with industry leaders. All category winners received Sony digital imaging equipment, and their work is now on view at Somerset House in London until May 5.

Finally, the evening paid tribute to legendary photojournalist Susan Meiselas, who was honored for Outstanding Contribution to Photography. Her work, which has consistently challenged power structures and championed collaboration, is featured prominently in a dedicated exhibition at Somerset House.

[via Sony World Photography Awards, images courtesy and featured with permission]