Earth Day arrives tomorrow, April 22nd and you can celebrate by visiting your local national parks for a fee-free day. With over 400 national parks and one in each state, there’s likely at least one near you. . . get your camera gear ready and head out for some photos and fresh air!
Don’t know which one to visit? The National Parks Service has created a handy interactive quiz that will help you narrow down your interests to a location that meets your needs based on distance, activities and more.
Share your photos online tagged with the #yourparkstory / #myparkstory hashtags and interact with others celebrating Earth Day at our protected natural places! Some of my best work, including photos from my upcoming magnum opus on international wildlife has been capture in our national parks. Enjoy the image gallery. Better yet, get out there and create your own!
National parks are powerful places that have many meanings and connections to those who visit them – our shared history, our sense of discovery, and our dreams of the future. They teach us about ourselves and the world around us, and invite us to continue to learn, grow, and explore. National Park Week is a time to reflect on what parks mean to us, enjoy what they provide to their visitors and communities, and commit to protecting these places we cherish.
In a win for wildlife, the latest tiger census in India has seen an increase of 200 tigers from just four years ago! Launched in the early 1970s, Project Tiger relocated entire villages to open up habitat corridors for the big cats, thus minimizing conflict with humans, and giving the wildlife room to rewild the lush sal and bamboo forests and grassy meadows.
Join me in November to experience the best India has to offer: we will travel to two national parks to photograph the elusive big cats as well as barasinghas, rhinos and the massive wild water buffalos. We might even see sloth bears and leopards!
November is a time of celebration too. Diwali, the festival of lights, is celebrated all over the country with spectacular light displays, gift-giving, a delicious sweets. It is a time of spiritual uplift, a celebration of good over evil, and the end of the harvest season.
You know what I loved about this latest “Winter in Japan” workshop? The Snow! Meaning snow was falling as we photographing in various locations. It made for great conditions at the snow monkey hot springs farther north in Hokkaido. It was positively magical with the iconic Japanese cranes; the world looked like a shaken snow globe. Using a faster shutter speed really emphasizes the snowflakes. Depending on the light conditions, I was using ISOs between 2000 and 4000 with my favorite 100-500mm lens.
Book projects lead me to all parts of the world. For an upcoming volume on the varied and fascinating faiths of the world I am working on, I ventured to Bangladesh to photograph the Bishwa Ijtemi. The World Muslim Congress has been held since 1942 in Tongi and it’s the second largest Muslim congregation in the world after the Holy Hajj. 4 million – and then some – Muslims gather here for several days of activities and devotion. Everyone arrives and departs on trains in Dhaka, resulting in a crush of humanity I’ve only ever experienced in the Kumbh Mela in India.
Bangladesh is a fascinating, gritty country full of extremely friendly and welcoming people. I don’t think I’ve ever had so many people want to take selfies with me—it’s not a country that gets a lot of tourists. In Cox’s Bazar we photographed the elegant moon boats; their crescent design aids fishermen to get across sand bars to shore. On the very real side of life, we photographed vast smoldering garbage fields, dusty brick factories, and Asia’s largest shipyard. These are hard workers, who appreciate everything they have and it shows!
10. The Moab region has so much to offer and we have park permits to conduct our workshop in both Canyonlands and Arches NP’s. This is a fantastic place to capture the beautifully sculpted rock formations and stars at night!
9. Check two National Parks off your bucket list. Do you have a National Parks passport? Maybe it’s time to get one and start visiting the sites of “Americas Best Idea!”
8. Our diverse itinerary includes a variety of locations; finding abstracts in reflections along the edges of the river, some of my favorite petroglyphs and pictographs, and of course night sessions.
7. Moab is a small town that relies on tourism to fuel its needs, great food and we plan to share some fantastic meals together!
6. Critiques – what good is a workshop if you’re not there to do a little work? I’ll be giving critiques of your photos as we review them and discuss!
5. Limited to just 8 participants, this retreat is designed to combine the best aspects of a relaxing vacation, inspiring seminar, and hands-on workshop all in one exquisite trip.
4. If you’re a movie buff, this location should be on your bucket list. Movies such as Thelma and Louise and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade filmed scenes here.
3. Mid-March is the perfect time to visit, when things are warming up from the cold winter, yet haven’t reached the scorching days of summer. With a bonus of snow capped LaSal mountain peaks making a great background.
2. Of course, hands-on instruction and educational lectures. I love to teach!
1. Adventuresome learning! I work hard to make sure everyone comes away from these workshops feeling better about and more enriched by their photography skills.
Today is World Hippo Day! As the second largest land animal on earth they are a great subject to juxtapose with smaller animals, especially the birds that swing by the pools and rivers where hippos congregate by day. They almost always live in communities of a dozen or more fellow hippos so capturing a group of them at once and then picking out some unique individuals to focus on can provide a variety of photographic opportunities.
Fun fact – Hippos secrete their own natural sunscreen! They release two chemicals that when combined, help block their skin from the harmful rays of the relentless African sun. These chemicals can turn pink or red when combined, earning them the term “blood sweat”. Yummy!
2022 was a great year for bird photography! Bookended by two photo productive trips to Brazil, I photographed storks in Morocco, mergansers in Alaska, ostriches in Namibia, oxpeckers in Botswana, and dippers in Canada.
Of course, I’ve shot more than just birds over the past year. Make sure you check back here often for more new photos from my travels. Better yet, join me on a workshop and we will make some memories together.
Enjoy the photos, and most importantly – have a Happy New Year!
Happy Holidays from Art Wolfe Headquarters in currently snowy Seattle! Here’s wishing everyone a safe and healthy winter with family and friends. As we move ahead to 2023, it’s important to also look back and reflect on the year that was.
For myself, that means reviewing a whole lot of trips and photos as I prepare the end of the year collection that I’ll eventually share with friends, including here on the blog with all of you! I’m still working on this, along side wrapping up final selections for Wild Lives, my epic opus on international wildlife coming in fall of 2023.
For the time being, here is a selection of my most recent images from Q4 of this year. Enjoy the photos, enjoy the season – and have a very happy New Year!
Art and design nerds rejoice! It’s the most magical time of the year – when Pantone announces their color of the year. For 2023, it’s Viva Magenta – a nearly wine-red take on the traditional magenta. As usual I’ve put together a gallery inspired by the color. Enjoy!
Pantone’s Color of the Year, Viva Magenta 18-1750, vibrates with vim and vigor. It is a shade rooted in nature descending from the red family and expressive of a new signal of strength. Viva Magenta is brave and fearless, and a pulsating color whose exuberance promotes a joyous and optimistic celebration, writing a new narrative.
This year’s Color of the Year is powerful and empowering. It is a new animated red that revels in pure joy, encouraging experimentation and self-expression without restraint, an electrifying, and a boundaryless shade that is manifesting as a stand-out statement. PANTONE 18-1750 Viva Magenta welcomes anyone and everyone with the same verve for life and rebellious spirit. It is a color that is audacious, full of wit and inclusive of all.
I’m happy to announce that Travels to the Edge Season 2 is now available for streaming on my Vimeo On-Demand channel – just in time, as DVDs are getting harder and harder to find. Check out fan-favorite episodes on Mongolia, Iceland, Australia and much more! To celebrate upcoming 2023 international workshops, I’m offering up two full episodes to watch completely free! Just sign up for my email list – don’t worry, I hate spam also!
Art Wolfe’s Travels to the Edge Season 2 Episode 1 – Japan: Hokkaido & Honshu
The Image many of us have of Japan is congested and kinetic. But Japan has a wild side. In winter, beyond its crowded cities, the country delivers quiet, unexpected natural beauty. In the second season opener, Art Wolfe ventures north to the remote region of Hokkaido to view iconic red-crested cranes; south to the mountains to film the mischievous macaque snow monkey; and journeys on to the sacred temples of Mt. Fuji and Koyosan on a photographic pilgrimage.
Art Wolfe’s Travels to the Edge Season 2 Episode 10 – The Kingdom of Bhutan
Known as the “Land of the Thunder Dragon”, Bhutan has survived in isolation for more than a thousand years. As this enlightened Buddhist kingdom greets the 21st century, its greatest challenge is to preserve its soul. In episode ten, Art Wolfe finds a photographer’s nirvana of mountainside monasteries, sacred festivals and chanting monks in an environmentally and spiritually progressive nation.
