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A kangaroo rocks it out in a field of wildflowers, clearly in the zone by the look on her face — it’s the height of comedy.

Or at least that’s what the judges of the Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards thought, bestowing their top 2023 prize to photographer Jason Moore for his aptly named photo, “Air Guitar Roo”. 

Up against 5,300 entries from 85 countries, Moore’s prize is a safari tour in the Masai Mara, Kenya, where the potential for more animals in hilarious situations awaits. 

Here’s his winning image alongside other category winners. 

Overall winner

Air Guitar Roo

Commenting on the day back in August 2021, Moore said he was attacked by ticks when trying to get the “perfect” image.

“When I saw this roo striking their air guitar pose, it immediately brought a smile to my face, and I knew that I had captured something really special,” he said.

According to the judging panel, the image encapsulated a “happy vibe and feel good factor” — the sole purpose of what comedy wildlife is all about.

Creatures of the Air winner

Creatures Under the Water winner

Junior and People’s Choice winner

Amazing Internet Portfolio winner

Scroll through to see the squirrel’s landing.

A ground squirrel jumped as if he could fly. To his surprise, he fell back down. (Timea Ambrus: Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2023)

Highly Commended winners

Here are a few of the highly commended images to have a giggle at.

You know what we should see more of? Photobombing kangaroos. That’s our primary conclusion after guffawing at all the whimsical winners of the Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2023

The highly commended cheeky ‘roo (which you can see below) is joined by many other animals caught in moments they’d rather forget. These include a white-winged dove flying straight into a tree, a very moody owl, and a long-tailed macaque monkey posing like Kate Winslet on a Titanic sofa. There really is something for everyone.

But the funniest animal of the year? Another kangaroo, this one seemingly rocking out and playing a spot of air guitar. The image, taken by Jason Moore, beat off some serious competition from over 5,000 entries from photographers from around the world.

Here are some of the winners and our top picks from this year’s Comedy Wildlife Awards.

Highly commended – Monday blahs

Highly commended – Boing

Highly commended – Snowball

Highly commended – The happy turtle

Highly commended – That wasn’t there yesterday

Highly commended – Rainforest dandy

Junior category winner & People’s choice winner – Dispute

Creatures of the air category winner – Unexpected plunge

Creatures under the water category winner – Otter ballerina

Overall winner – Air guitar roo

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These dark figures are buffaloes crossing parched grassland in Bangladesh during their search for food. Taken by photographer Shafiul Islam, the picture highlights the devastating droughts in northern and western Bangladesh, which have depleted food and water supplies for both people and nature.

It is among the breathtaking entries in this year’s Environmental Photographer of the Year competition, which depict the alarming reality of climate change and humanity’s efforts to repair our relationship with nature.

This atmospheric shot of a swarm of soldier flies (Hermetia illucens), which was taken by photographer Maurizio di Pietro, took home the competition’s grand prize. The subjects of the image are about to become insect flour, as part of research at the University of Turin, Italy, looking into alternative, more sustainable sources of protein.

Just off the coast of Aruba in the Caribbean Sea, photographer Nicolas Marin snapped this glowing, jade-coloured coral. The striking luminescence was captured under ultraviolet light during a night dive. “This photo is important because it showcases the wonder and fragility of marine life and the need to protect it,” said Marin in a statement. “Bioluminescence is a fascinating natural phenomenon that indicates the health of the ocean.”

Other pictures that made the competition’s shortlist include photographer Gil Bartz’s shot of two climate activists stood at the edge of an open pit mine in Lützerath, Germany. The mine opened in the 1980s, primarily to extract a type of coal called lignite, and led to the displacement of over 30,000 people.

On the coast of Matinhos in Brazil, Denis Ferreira Netto photographed efforts to restore the seafront. Large diggers take sand from the sea to refortify the beach and provide better defence against the ocean.

A pair of divers in Bali, Indonesia, are installing concrete blocks at a coral restoration site in this shot by Giacomo d’Orlando. These are meant to act as an artificial nursery for new coral to grow, in an effort to reverse damage to the marine ecosystem caused by unsustainable fishing practices.

A photo of a kangaroo channeling its inner Jimi Hendrix has been crowned the winner of the Comedy Wildlife Photo Awards 2023. Taken by Australian photographer Jason Moore, Air Guitar Roo was up against over 5,000 entries from 85 countries but the perfectly timed capture was unanimously voted as the judge’s top pick. 

Landing him not only the overall prize but the Creatures of the Land category too, Jason’s kangaroo shoot was completely unplanned. His winning image was taken after a disappointing morning trying to shoot waterfowl at a nearby lake. On his way home Jason pulled over at a spot he knew was popular among a mob of Eastern Grey kangaroos so crouched down in the tick-infested grasslands to capture the roos and joey’s. 

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Sometimes it’s the unexpected shots that turn out the best and looking back on that day Jason remarks, “The shoot turned out to be a great session and I am quite fond of several images that I captured. Not many people know that kangaroos are normally fairly docile and even a bit boring most of the time if I’m honest. However, when I saw this roo striking the air guitar pose it immediately brought a smile to my face and I knew that I had captured something really special.”

He took the shot on his Sony A1 with an FE 600mm f/4 GM OSS telephoto, with a 1.4x teleconverter. The exposure was 1/1000sec at f/5.6, ISO 2500.

In total six category winners were recognized for their wildlife capture including Vittorio Ricci who claimed the Creatures of the Air award for her image Unexpected Plunge showing a striated heron falling out of the sky and into water. A photo of a charming Ballerina Otter taken by Otter Kwen in Singapore won the Under Water category while Timea Ambrus won the portfolio award for his series of four images taken of a ground squirrel launching into the air. 

The video category was awarded to Lily Bernau for her brilliant film ‘Too Cold’ which documented a penguin refusing to jump in the sea while the young photographer award went to Jacie Stankiewicz for his photo of two green finches engaged in an “argument”. Titled Dispute, the photo also won the public vote in the Affinity Photo People’s Choice award marking the first time it’s been won by a young photographer.

Tom Sullam, co-founder of the competition describes seeing the immense talent combined with humor as one of the greatest pleasures that he and co-founder Paul Johnson Hicks get to experience. “This year’s People’s Choice Award winner is like the cherry on the cake. To have a junior entrant win this major prize is extremely rewarding for us. We want more juniors to enter, we want to take our conservation message and our love og photography to the younger generation and this result proves that tongue photographers have as much of a chance of winning as anyone else.”

Alongside the winning mages, 10 entries were also highlighted and commended including a shot of a very fed-up owl, a monkey showing you the way and my personal favorite, a happy turtle with a dragonfly resting on its mouth. 

Jason Moore, this year’s Comedy Wildlife Photographer of the Year wins a one in a one-in-a-lifetime safari to the Masai Mara, Kenya with Alex Walker’s Serian plus a unique handmade trophy from the Wonder Workshop plus two stylish Retrospective camera bags from Think Tank. To view the full gallery of winning and highly commended images head to the Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards website.

If you want to get into capturing animals in their natural habitat, the best cameras for wildlife photography will help you on your way

Dolly Faibyshev

Self-taught artist Dolly Faibyshev works out of New York, a city as diverse as her subjects. Her work has been published in The New Yorker, TIME, Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, and a litany of other publications.

What’s your earliest memory of Thanksgiving? 

I love Thanksgiving. It’s not only acceptable to be gluttonous and eat as much as possible, it’s encouraged and promoted. Oh yeah, and I love spending it with my family. My mom makes the best spread. She always overfeeds for every holiday—there are like three entrées served before the turkey even makes it to the table. This is how I always remember spending Thanksgiving, so I don’t have an earlier memory of it being any different.

My mom shared an early memory of her first Thanksgiving in the U.S. as a Russian immigrant in 1981 when I was a baby. She didn’t know what to do, so she ordered a pre-cooked turkey from John Wanamaker’s department store. She didn’t think it was very good and quickly figured out that she could make a better version herself, and she has ever since. I’m thankful for that.

How would you characterize your practice?

I started taking photos in desperation. I was working corporate 9-to-5 office jobs for maybe eight years after college, and I had this hazy, creative feeling inside of me dying to get out, but I kept searching for ways to express myself artistically, and failing. I was so hungry to make something happen, and photography clicked—after a lot of practice and trial and error, of course. I just wanted to make art and survive doing it, so whenever I take a photo that makes me smile, I know I did something right.

Where and how did you take these photos?

I took this in 2013, exactly 10 Thanksgivings ago. I was with my husband’s family that year, and circumstances forced us to have the dinner in a bare-bones restaurant in the middle of nowhere. I loathed the idea of spending Thanksgiving at a public buffet, so I brought my little point-and-shoot and took some photos of the desserts on the table out of boredom.

I quickly realized that sharing this space with families that also weren’t able to have dinner in their homes, but still managed to make something happen, had its own warm, communal feeling. I started to feel the love spending this Thanksgiving tradition in a nontraditional way, seeing families expressing love alongside other families. All those feelings inspired me to create this photo collage.

Pete Lee

Filmmaker and photographer Pete Lee began his career in San Francisco, premiering the short film Don’t Be a Hero in 2018 at Sundance. The following year, the Rainin Foundation sponsored his screenplay High Priestess of Souls, and in 2022, his cookbook, Mister Jiu’s in Chinatown, won the James Beard Book Award.

What’s your earliest memory of Thanksgiving?

I grew up in Taiwan, where the only turkey I’d tasted growing up was the Chiayi turkey rice—where they’d fry shredded turkey meat in shallot oil and drizzle it over a bowl of steamy white rice. I didn’t get to experience the American Thanksgiving until middle school, in Boston, where I got in a fist fight with another kid in my apartment building. Come to think of it, it was probably the last time I won a fight.

What feelings does the holiday evoke for you?

As an immigrant kid, Thanksgiving never made a lot of sense to me. It always felt like a practice run for Christmas, where the movies just weren’t half as good, the snow hadn’t found its footing, and the vacation was half as long. But as I got older, the health and mortality of my folks started to feel less and less abstract. They’re both now in their 70s, and it gets quite heavy once I realized that at some point, we’ll need to start counting down how many of these meaningless holidays we actually get to spend with one another. I don’t know, but they’re only getting more finite with each passing November.

How would you characterize your practice?

I am a fight choreographer turned social worker turned photographer. I don’t know how to properly convey the throughline between these seemingly disparate practices, but it’s there. My goal, I guess, is for you to understand this throughline when you glance at my work.

Where and how did you take these photos?

These were candids taken on Thanksgiving 2017. My relatives in SoCal held a big gathering where family members flew in from all over. I was there as the lone representative of my East Coast clan. I never much loved these gatherings because they always ended up asking me for a bunch of free photos. One of my cousins was selling diet supplements so she always asked for shots where she looked hot standing next to high-calorie dishes, and in general everyone would have notes about how they looked.

I thought about leaving my camera at home, but brought it with me anyway. I had to improvise my lighting setup, and managed to stick my remote flash above the cabinets, using the ceiling as a giant, soft diffusion. After surprisingly few rounds of notes, the family approved. In hindsight, I was glad to have brought my camera because, as it turned out, it would’ve been the last Thanksgiving for two of my favorite aunts. Both of them passed away from cruel and sudden illnesses and, as you could see, both of them still had so, so, so much life to live and to give. I miss them.

Shaun Pierson

Shaun Pierson, who received his MFA from the Yale School of Art, works across photography and video out of New York. The 2023-24 recipient of the Sharpe-Walentas Studio Program has shown work at François Ghebaly, Amanita, and Green Gallery, among other locations.  

What’s your earliest memory of Thanksgiving?

Watching my grandmother drop a frozen turkey on her foot. She broke two toes but never canceled dinner. I still think about that moment every time she goes to pull the turkey from the freezer. She’s a rock star.

What feelings does the holiday evoke for you?

The roots of Thanksgiving are quite sinister, so naturally I’m disturbed. America has always been so preoccupied with self-aggrandizing, and this holiday is a perfect example of that. For me, Thanksgiving is less about “giving thanks” (to whom?) and more so about connecting with family members I have not seen in a long time. I like getting together every year and seeing how people have changed.

How would you characterize your practice?

A man, a camera, and the tension that exists between a photographer and their subject. Photography is an excuse for me to exercise some sort of control over my life.

When and where did you take these photos?

I took these photos of my family a few years back in New Jersey. I always utilize the holidays as a time to take my camera out and photograph those close to me as much as possible, and I’m consistently drawn to the ways in which people immediately begin to perform when the camera is visible. That sense of play is so hard to come by in daily life, and I’m really moved when people will get together to help me make a photograph.

Jonathan Zizzo

Dallas-based Jonathan Zizzo has been working for over 20 years in commercial and editorial photography, shooting for the Dallas Mavs, The New York Times, Catbird, the Phoenix Suns, and more.

What’s your earliest memory of Thanksgiving?

Being a young lad sitting around the television watching football and playing with siblings in the yard till dinner was ready.

What feelings does the holiday evoke for you?

It’s kinda Americana in the South to just sit around and watch a game as you are having your Thanksgiving with family and friends, so I suppose it’s just a good time to halt everything and just get into a turkey coma after the big meal. Everything shuts down so you sort of just have to embrace the day and realize you’re in for a feast.

How would you characterize your practice?

I like to approach all jobs with a sense of spontaneity, leaving room for opportunities that sometimes were never a part of the original idea or concept. I traditionally stay curious about all things and the world around me, so that always keeps things fresh.

Where and how did you take these photos?

The photos were originally shot for a U.K. Newspaper through Getty images in ‘09. It was so exciting running around that day creating images of what happens with tailgaters and the NFL for Thanksgiving. 

Gillian Laub

New York-based Gillian Laub has released a number of monographs—including Testimony, Southern Rites, and Family Matters—dissecting issues of race, media, and family dynamics.

What’s your earliest memory of the holiday? 

Earliest memory of Thanksgiving is from Polaroids I took and still have from when I was 7 years old, with all my cousins and my father and grandfather carving the turkey together. 

What feelings does the holiday evoke for you? 

Bittersweetness. My grandparents were a huge part of my Thanksgiving memories. It always marked the time of our whole family being together. I miss my grandparents being there.

How would you characterize your practice?  

I am not a fly on the wall. It’s more like I am choreographing reality through the camera, if that makes sense?! Then, later, I weave the narrative through the editing process.

Where and how did you take these photos?

They are photos from Thanksgiving at my parents’ and sister’s in Westchester. Our Thanksgiving dinners migrated to my sister’s home in 2005.

Arielle Weenonia Gray

New Haven-based photographer Arielle Weenonia Gray is a recent graduate of the Yale School of Art’s Master’s program, and has been featured in a number of publications, including Vogue, Aperture, The New York Times, and right here at CULTURED.

What’s your earliest memory of Thanksgiving?

Going to Wendy’s with my mom and twin sister for a Christmas ornament toy from the 2000 film How the Grinch Stole Christmas. We got home that night to set up the tree, and I remember us making cookies (always burning the bottom) and putting the Grinch ornament on the tree.

What feelings does the holiday evoke for you?

Sadness from nostalgia, warmth from being able to be present with my family.

How would you characterize your practice?

I would characterize my practice as based in sentimentality, constantly shifting between autofiction and the uncanny. I am constantly crying (joy and sadness), writing, and taking photographs. Not necessarily in that order.

Where and how did you take these photos?

The black and white photo, After 26 years, she has sent us out into the world to love and love again, was taken in my home in Tuscaloosa, Alabama during my winter break from Yale. My mother was cradling my sister’s face one night, and I asked them to replicate that moment for me. My mother’s hands have always felt iconic to me.

The photo featuring the gloves, It’s Our Party, was taken in New Haven with my friends Alexandria Couch and Kayla Hawkins. I had ventured to the fashion district to borrow dresses from Batsheva Hay, and I decided we would play pretend. I love the process of getting ready, especially during the holidays—glitter, mesh, red, silver, and gold rule my world. We cleared out my bedroom, put on the gloves, and danced around my bedroom.