Wildlife Photographer of the Year

Bard Fort hosts the 61^st edition of Wildlife Photographer of the Year, the most important award dedicated to nature photography promoted by the Natural History Museum in London. Showcasing some of the best photography talent from around the world. The winning images embark on an international tour reaching over a million people. The shots are presented in an evocative display in the Cannoniere area. The exhibition turns the spotlight on powerful and fascinating images that capture little-known animal behaviour, spectacular species and very different natural contexts. Using the unique emotional power of photography, the images share stories and species from around the world, encouraging a future of planetary advocacy.

This year's competition attracted more than 60,000 entries from photographers of all ages and experience levels, from 113 countries. The works were judged anonymously for creativity, originality and technical excellence by an international jury of industry experts. The disturbing scene of a brown hyena among the skeletal remains of an abandoned diamond mining town in Kolmanskop, Namibia, by South African photographer Wim van den Heever is the winning image of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2025. A truly exceptional shot: in order to take Ghost Town Visitor, with camera trap technology, the South African nature photographer waited a decade after first noticing the tracks of the animal. The title of Young Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2025 was won by Andrea Dominizi, the first Italian ever to win the prestigious award for wildlife photographers aged 17 and under. His image After the Destruction tells a poignant story of habitat loss, that of a Cerambycidae beetle in a deforested area in the Lepini Mountains in central Italy.

The other Italians who stood out in the competition are: the South Tyrolean Philipp Egger, winner in the "Animal Portraits" category with the shot Shadow Hunter, an eagle owl in the mountains of Naturno (Bolzano) that emerges from the darkness with the orange glint of its eyes and the evening light on its feathers, and three finalists with honorable mention: Fortunato Gatto with The frozen swan in the "Art of nature" category, Roberto Marchegiani with The calm after the storm and Shadowlands in the "Animals in their environment" category and Gabriella Comi with Wake-up call in the "Behavior: Mammals" category.