Spectacular photographs from the sky; incredible snapshots from a bird’s eye view that in the past would have been unthinkable and that are now part of our reality. They are images made with drones, a modality that since its birth has not stopped adding followers. This led the Art Photo Travel Association – the promoter of the Siena International Photo Awards – to organize the Drone Photo Awards in 2018, which, upon reaching the sixth edition, became the most important international competition dedicated to aerial photography in the world.
The jury has not had an easy time choosing the winning images, since it has had the participation of thousands of professionals and amateurs from 107 countries around the globe. The 2023 photo of the year award went to Israeli artist Or Adar with a shocking snapshot titled Must Resist that he captured at a demonstration in Israel earlier in the year.
The contest is divided into nine categories: Urban (urban areas); Wildlife (wild life); Sport (sport); People (people); Nature(nature); Abstract (abstract landscapes); Wedding (weddings); Storyboard (graphic story) and Video (video). All the winning works can be seen in the Above us Only Sky exhibition, which will take place from September 30 to November 19 at the Abbey of San Galgano in Siena, the beautiful town of Tuscany, within the framework of the festival of visual arts.
This year’s edition includes a Spaniard among the winners: Ignacio Médem, an amateur photographer specializing in the animal world who won the prize in the Abstract category. In recent years he has opted for the use of drones to capture images, for which he has received various awards. His snapshot, The Exhausted Lungs of Earth (The exhausted lungs of the Earth) are a tangible example of how the point of view from above can be different.
Must Resist (We must resist) is the best photo of 2023, a spectacular snapshot that captures tens of thousands of protesters -many of them covered by gigantic banners- in full protest against the judicial reform of the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu. The image of Or Adar immortalizes the protest that took place in Tel Aviv on March 4 for the ninth consecutive week.
In the urban spaces category, the winning work was Playground, by Sebastian Piórek, a Polish photographer who captures a bright children’s playground in Chorzów, a mining town in southern Poland. The harmony and colorful atmosphere of the image reflect the leisure possibilities of a space that contrasts with its industrial landscape.
The Indian Dhanu Paran is the author of Sleeping Giant (Sleeping Giant). In the photograph, taken in the Anamalai tiger reserve, in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, an elephant is seen sleeping peacefully blended into the foliage. It is a beautiful image of wildlife that creates a visual fusion between the skin of the pachyderm and the vegetation that surrounds it.
Highline is the title of the dizzying photograph taken in January 2021 by David Machet in the French Alps, awarded in the sports category. The image of the Frenchman captures the feat of Nathan Paulin, a renowned tightrope walker who, defying the low temperatures, manages to successfully complete the crossing of a “high line” 200 meters long and 2.5 meters wide at 2,460 meters high at Pointe d’Areu.
English photographer Simon Heather has received the award for an amusing image captured on the picturesque Portuguese beach of Cascais. Under the name of Beach Bliss -something like happiness on the beach- he captures a colorful beach print in which umbrellas, towels and bathers embody the happiest and most relaxed face of summer.
The winning image in the nature category Austfonna Ice Cap is the work of another Indian, Thomas Vijayan; a snapshot that invites reflection on the serious effects of climate change. The photographer, who had visited this hidden ice field on several occasions to the northwest of the Svalbard archipelago, in Norway, denounces that in his last expedition, in June of last year, part of the ice sheet had already melted, which allowed him to navigate between plates.
The best “abstract” photograph of this year’s contest is entitled The Exhausted Lungs of Earth (Los Pulmones Exhausted de la Tierra) and is signed by Ignacio Médem. The image shows an overhead view of the Colorado River basin, simulating the x-ray of lungs without oxygen. “The intricate patterns formed by water, metaphorically similar to the lungs of the earth, have been exhausted and are teetering on the brink of collapse”, indicates the description of the Madrid photographer who gives a wake-up call on the serious situation suffered by the American West due to mismanagement and prolonged drought.
A romantic image of a newlywed couple in Poland captured by Krzysztof Krawczyk, a local artist, took first prize in the wedding category. Entitled Swin in the stars, the snapshot captures the scene of a flower-adorned boat floating on a lake amid clouds, surrounded by thousands of dry leaves resembling stars.
The image that precedes this text is part of Foodscapes, a succession of nine spectacular photographs taken by the American George Steinmetz. The series aims to explore the food supply on a planetary scale and address the challenge of feeding the nearly ten billion people on Earth projected by 2050 without encroaching on more wilderness.
The Bashir Abu Sakra signs the last of the awards of the Drone Photo Awards 2023 with a spectacular video entitled Why I Travel The World Alone (Why I Travel Alone around the World). In just over three and a half minutes, the German summarizes four years of travel through spectacular images. The autobiographical short film combines dizzying landscapes with familiar childhood footage of him.
