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© SR Bhattacharyya

Congratulations to all the 2025 winners

Now in its fifth year, the Prince Albert Il of Monaco Foundation Environmental Photography Award has once again attracted a stunning collection of entries, with 10,000 images submitted from around the globe.

The awards are an annual contest created with the aim of rewarding photographers who put their creativity to good use in raising awareness of the importance of environmental protection.

All the shortlisted images will be presented in an exhibition in the Principality of Monaco from 3rd June to 31st July, 2025, then touring in various locations around the world, as well as being printed in a high-quality photography book.

An Award Ceremony will be held on 6th June in Monaco in the presence of the Grand Prize winner, members of the jury and shortlisted photographers.

We look forward to rewarding more great work in the 2026 edition from 2nd of September to 2nd of November, 2025.

The Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation Environmental Photographer 2025

Angel Fitor

with 'Unseen Unsung Heroes'

The 2025 Grand Prize winner, selected by our prestigious jury of photography professionals, is this stunning image of worms flushing sand out of their burrows in the Mediterranean by natural history photographer Angel Fitor.

As members of the endofauna – a huge, diverse community adapted to underground life at sea – these burrowing worms play a pivotal role in maintaining oxygen and nutrient circulation in the upper layer of sediment on the seabed, an activity that generates an entire ecosystem hidden under the substrate. All the seagrass beds along the world’s coasts, the riches of coastal estuaries and deepwater muddy beds, and the vast biodiversity associated with soft-bottom sea floors rely on the existence of these little-known worms. Their collective silent action thus has a massive impact on a global scale.

With this image, Angel wins the title of Environmental Photographer 2025 and the related €5000 grant. In addition Angel wins €2000 for his category wins in both the "Ocean Worlds" category (with this image) and the “Change Makers: Reasons for Hope” category with the image Training Day, showcasing a baby loggerhead sea turtle in a recovery centre in Spain. As Grand Prize winner, Angel is invited (travel and accommodation included) to Monaco for the 2025 Award Ceremony.

Public Award 2025

The Public Award was chosen from the shortlisted images by a public vote which was open to all. Almost 2,000 votes were cast, and the winner is this image by Fernando Faciole of a tapir nicknamed Valente recovering after sustaining severe burns on its feet and ears from a wildfire in the Pantanal region of South America.

Fernando Faciole

with 'After the Flames, Hope’

Students’ Choice 2025

The Students' Choice prize is chosen by a selection of the school students of Monaco. Bambang Wirawan wins the €500 prize for his image of a Sumatran tiger.

Bambang Wirawan

with ‘Forest Guard’

Category Winners 2025

The awards comprise five categories. Within each category our awards jury selected a winning image, which receives a €1000 prize, two runners-up images, and other shortlisted images that will appear in the exhibition and book.

Polar Wonders

Images depicting landscapes, wildlife and local communities in the Arctic and Antarctic polar regions illustrated as pristine areas to be preserved.

1st place

Galice Hoarau with ‘Jellyfish and Iceberg’

Runner-up

Miquel Angel Artus Illana with ‘Female Fight’

Runner-up

Michael Arzur with 'Ephemeral'

Into the Forest

Images highlighting the beauty of the flora and fauna that make up the forest ecosystem and the lives of native communities in the boreal, temperate and tropical forests.

1st place

Iacopo Nerozzi with 'Clash of Kings'

Runner-up

Santiago Monroy Garcia with 'God in the shadows'

Runner-up

David Herasimtschuk with 'Coho Salmon in a Log Structure'

Ocean Worlds

Images that illustrate the richness of our seas and oceans, whether on or under the surface, and showcase the diversity of marine wildlife.

1st place

Angel Fitor with 'Unseen Unsung Heroes'

Runner-up

Pietro Formis with 'The Passenger'

Runner-up

Daniel Sly with 'Portrait of a Leafy Seadragon"

Humanity Versus Nature

Images that depict the conflicting relationship between humans and nature, and the negative impact of human activities on the environment: issues related to the consequences of climate change (droughts, wildfires, extreme climate events…), the loss of biodiversity (endangered species, disastrous interactions between humans and wildlife…), as well as the depletion of the world’s water resources.

1st place

Amy Jones with 'Breeding Machine'

Runner-up

Lakshitha Karunarathna with 'Camouflaged in the Garbage Dump'

Runner-up

Javier Aznar Gonzalez de Rueda with 'No Air in the Pit'

Change Makers: Reasons for Hope

Images that highlight the efforts and actions implemented globally by communities and organisations that help build a more sustainable world and more harmonious relationship between man and nature. It aims to demonstrate hope for Humanity and for the Planet. Images should include a human element or impact, and not focus purely on the technologies involved.

1st place

Angel Fitor with 'Training Day'

Runner-up

Fernando Faciole with 'Caring for the Unseen Giants'

Runner-up

Fernando Faciole with ‘Little Giant's Walk’

Exhibition and Tours

Find out more

Every year, at the end of the competition, the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation presents that year’s Environmental Photography Award at an outdoor exhibition in the Principality of Monaco.

Large-format prints of the shortlisted and winning photographs are displayed in the heart of the tourist centre, conveying to the public the environmental values dear to the Sovereign and the Principality, and raising awareness of the issues.

The exhibition then travels internationally, contributing to the promotion of the Environmental Photography Award and the Foundation.

© Eric Mathon

Aaron Gekoski

with ‘See No Evil’

The 2024 Grand Prize winner, selected by our prestigious jury of photography professionals, is this poignant image of an orangutan shot at a wildlife tourism attraction in Bangkok by environmental photojournalist and film-maker Aaron Geskoski.

Orangutans are commonly used in performances across Asia. Here at Safari World they have to perform a number of routines, like ‘dancing’ in bikinis and fighting each other. After the shows, they are used for photo opportunities. In the background we see the Three Wise Monkeys - see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil – symbolic of how we ignore the cruelties inherent in these activities. In order to supply attractions such as these orangutans are often stolen from the wild, with their mothers killed in the process.

Aaron wins the title of Environmental Photographer of the Year 2024, alongside a €5000 grant, an invitation including travel and accommodation to the University of Ecuador’s Amazon Research Station in the heart of the Ecuadorian jungle, and an invitation including travel and accommodation to Monaco for the 2024 Award Ceremony.

Organised in partnership with

More about our partners

Protecting & Progressing Planetary Health

HSH Prince Albert II of Monaco very early on promoted the ideal of a new relationship with nature and the various species with which we share our Earth. Aware that we were disrupting all the major planetary balances instead of safeguarding them, thus endangering the future of humanity, and having witnessed firsthand the profound upheavals wrought by the effects of climate change the Sovereign decided to become personally involved through His Foundation in order to amplify His action in favour of the environment.

Launched in 2006, the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation has become a leading NGO for the preservation and education of sustainable development on a global scale. For fifteen years, the Foundation has significantly contributed to more than 750 projects focused on three main domains of action – climate change, biodiversity and water, in three priority areas: the Mediterranean basin, the Polar Regions, and the Least Developed Countries.

The global crisis we are facing today urges us to form a new relationship with a nature we thought we dominated, and it shows us that we cannot exist without it. The Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation has the strong conviction that together we can positively rise from this crisis. By joining forces, we can create a more sustainable world for the generations to come.

Find out more about the Foundation
Visit the Foundation's Award website