Wildlife Artist of the Year
2023 Winners Gallery
Our expert judging panel reviewed an incredible 1,650 entries from 900 artists across 56 countries, and each piece was judged anonymously, based on its originality, narrative, and technical skill.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
Anisha’s watercolour painting aims to record the glorious lives of wild tigers as they would look in man’s faded and distant memory. Anisha prays that a time when wild tigers no longer exist will never come.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Anisha Heble celebrates the natural world through her art. She endeavours to capture the infinite beauty and energy of wildlife that is so fragile in today’s world. Anisha loves the fluidity and spontaneity of watercolou, along with the mastery required to control this medium to capture the undefined beauty of nature. After spending over 20 years in advertising and design, Anisha now dedicates herself entirely to her passions of wildlife and painting, and donates part of her earnings through art towards conservation and animal care. Anisha lives and works in Dubai.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
A hunter, a mother, and a fearless protector. The lioness prowls, stealthy and graceful, amidst the shadows toward her prey. This was the inspiration for Gale More O’Ferrall’s sensitively rendered painting. Gale recalls that, as a Zimbabwean, she has spent time in close proximity with these wildcats and on becoming a mother herself grew a deep admiration for the maternal behaviour of the lioness.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Gale More-O’Ferrall is a full time professional representational artist who works mainly in oils and acrylics. Growing up in Zimbabwe, Gale went on to study fine arts at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. Gale’s work is eclectically rich in subject matter and reflects her sincere appreciation of the people and places that have formed her life’s journey so far. She has been teaching internationally for 25 years and in 2011 moved to Vancouver where she has made her mark on the north American art scene.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
In Katy Rundle’s colourful and creatively detailed mixed media piece ‘Essential Worker’, a white backed African vulture looks to the sky for his kettle. Katy was inspired by these magnificent birds whilst living in Kenya, although her reference photo was taken at the Hawk Conservancy in Andover, UK. Katy’s aim through her artwork is to highlight the critical importance and beauty of the African vulture.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Katy Rundle is a British contemporary textile artist. Her business was founded in 2017 and she creates her pieces from a studio in Hampshire, UK. Katy is best known for her vibrant embroidered textile collages. An exhibitor at Talos Art Galley and at art fairs, Katy is in demand as a creator of bespoke, original commissions and her work is collected on both sides of the Atlantic. Shortlisted for the Women United Art Prize in 2022, Katy was also selected to compete in Sky Arts ‘Landscape Artist of the Year’ in 2018.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
Lieze Meyer observes that we tend to be more aware of the big mammals that are facing extinction. With this oil painting on canvas Lieze wanted to highlight a lesser recognised member on the Critically Endangered List, the White Headed Vulture. Her dramatic composition contrasts the small vulture against the larger non-endangered marabou stork as the vulture fights for it’s rights, and Lieze hopes her painting will help to highlight it’s endangered status.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Lieze Meyer has a BA graphic design degree but has pursued painting in oils for the past 15 years. Lieze aims to capture a fleeting moment whilst telling a story through her art. Shape, movement and mood are all elements which drive her to create from her studio in the wilderness in Zambia where she currently lives. By creating these wildlife images, she strives to make her audience aware of the beauty hidden within the more unknown and not so often painted creatures of this planet.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
The synergy of cultural and environmental narratives inspired Nickolaas Willems to create this large artwork. It represents the resilience and endurance of a Jewish family that found refuge within this tree during WW2. Nickolaas uses wood and fire (representing life and destruction) to burn and scrape his art pieces, using wooden panels as his canvas; heat and sandpaper as a brush of paint. This is part of a 20-tree series project, highlighting trees worldwide with their unique story and relevance.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Nickolaas Willems (1989) is a double educated Dutch artist. Working in a unique manner, within the representational field, Nickolaas uses the primitive medium of wood and fire to burn and scrape his art pieces into reality. A technique in which large wooden panels serve as his canvas, he utilises heat and sandpaper as paint. This time-intensive process requires extraordinary patience and focus by working with the natural lines of each wooden panel to create pieces that preserve the natural beauty of the material. Willems’ work explores themes of transience and time, reminding us of the impermanence of life while honouring the enduring beauty of the environment.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
Nathalie Daigle observes that skin is a sense organ, and as such is both a separator and a connector between self and others. In her abstract painting ‘Openness’, Nathalie depicts the elephant skin stretched out in a limitless sky, feeling this stands as an ‘openness’ to awaken our senses to life on earth and its interconnectedness.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Biology studies and scenic art emerged as Nathalie Daigle’s first interests, these two fields stemming from her deep love of nature and art. Creating has evolved into an expression of Nathalie’s inner connection to nature, in which she expresses life as being our common core. With close-ups of elephant skins that tell stories about how tightly connected our life cycles are, she demonstrates her exceptional sensitivity. As a wildlife lover and environmental artist, Nathalie’s artwork clearly asserts that the need for connection with the wild is part of human nature. She feels that to encounter the wild has an impact on mankind, that impact being humility.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
Sarah Lake has created the shoebill stork ‘Abou’ by carefully hand cutting her from 8 sheets of A3 hammered paper. Sarah chose her illustration of a shoebill stork as she loves how different and prehistoric they look.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Sarah Lake is a self taught paper artist living in Kent. With a love of wildlife, most of her work is based on that theme. Every piece starts off with a photograph which is normally taken by Sarah, which she will then separate into layers. The more layers there are the more detail there will be in the final artwork. Each layer is then cut by hand using a scalpel. Sarah’s aim with each piece of her work is that it is indistinguishable at a distance from a regular picture, and only when seen up close does the viewer discover individual layers of paper.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
Rhythm Ghai feels God has created an array of mesmerizing marine life and that it is the responsibility of mankind to conserve their natural habitat. Through her highly detailed and intricate drawing, Rhythm has aimed to create awareness and to help save these amazing sea creatures from becoming extinct.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Rhythm Ghai is a self taught artist from India. Rhythm works with a flair to create artworks which highlight the problems of global warming and animal extinction. She likes to work in black and white and in a variety of mediums. Taking part in a number of national and international exhibitions, Rhythm is keen to keep developing her creative skills. She believes that as an artist she is a teller of stories and that this is her creative journey.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
Humans have long destroyed the homes of orangutans for their gain. In Ophelia Redpath’s oil painting we see an orangutan, faced with a chainsaw and leaving it well alone. Ophelia illustrates that never in a million years would the thought occur to an orangutan to topple a forest and its inhabitants.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Ophelia Redpath has followed a career as a painter since 1986. The subject and style of her work has evolved from abstract, experimental beginnings, to mixed media celebrations of humanity, now focusing entirely on questioning the broken links between human civilisation and the natural world. Ophelia’s current oil paintings express a mix of grief, optimism and humour, with an attempt to visualise how these links can be recognised and reinvigorated. Her book ‘The Lemur’s Tale’ was nominated for the 2014 Kate Greenaway Medal, and Ophelia won Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year in 2021.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
This creative sculpture by Camila Echavarria depicts a guayacan tree and huge ceibas surrounded by native birds. From whichever side the piece is viewed there are barcodes to be seen that transform into forest. Inspired by the works of Garcia Marquez, Camilla hopes to inspire appreciation of nature with a reminder to cherish the trees, birds and nature.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Camila Echavarria is a Colombian artist who draws inspiration from her profound connection to the vibrant jungles and diverse ecosystems of her native country. With a background in product design engineering, Camila explores materials and perspectives that bring art to life. Her works reflect the rich flora and fauna of Colombia, with a focus on plants, birds, and their interplay. Through merging opposing concepts, Camila creates nature-rooted art characterised by simplified shapes, repetitive patterns and Fibonacci principles. Her compositions are primarily black and white, punctuated by bursts of the tropical colours that attract birds. Celebrating resilience, Camila’s art transcends boundaries, capturing the essence of the Tropic and its cultural heritage.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
Tamara Pokorny recalls how getting close to a ghost crab takes patience (and indeed sometimes a wet belly). However, her patience and sogginess paid off and she loves the way the evening sun made this little ghost crab’s shadow larger than life. Tamara considers her scratchboard and ink rendering to be an analogy reminding her about how small things can loom large, for both good or ill.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
From iconic species to lesser known or even disliked ones, scratchboard artist Tamara Pokorny depicts animals in extraordinary detail, showcasing the beauty of the creatures that share the world with mankind. Tamara is inspired by the intricacies of a subject you can only see when looking closely, the way the sum of all the small things amount to, and shapes, the whole. Tamara observes that as we often don’t take time to look at detail, she invites the viewer to look a little closer and immerse themselves in a moment in time.
ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
‘The Journey’ by Karen Laurence-Rowe, is a tribute to the dead and dying giraffe suffering the terrible drought in North Kenya. Whilst Karen’s painting, with its striking verdigris palette, looks to be abstract, on closer inspection there are various references to giraffe. Through this painting Karen sadly observes climate change is causing terrible suffering – and that wildlife will be the first to die.
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
A past winner of Wildlife Artist of the Year, Karen Laurence-Rowe has, for many years, used her art to raise funds for conservation, raising over £100,000 for conservation projects close to her heart throughout her career. Karen is a self-taught artist, mainly working in oil and watercolour to develop her unique style which has become much sought after by her art collectors. Karen has lived in Africa all her life and has watched her subjects dwindle exponentially as the human population grows. “It is a race against time to save the endangered species of the world but the David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation is a good place to start!”
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