2014’s Travel Photographers of the Year

By Gabrielle Lipton - April 8, 2015

Jakub Rybicki received Best Single Image in a Portfolio for this image taken during an 800-kilometer bike trip across the frozen surface of Siberia’s Lake Baikal.
New Talent Portfolio winner Massimiliano Fabrizi photographed the grave beauty of Cuba in his set of works.
Members of the Society of Elegant Persons of the Congo—better known as the Sapeurs—appear in this photo shot by Johnny Haglund on the streets of Kinshasa.
Andrea Francolini’s portrait of a girl in the northern Pakistan village of Shitindas received a special mention.
British photographer Philip Lee Harvey was the competition’s overall winner for his portfolio of images from Ethiopia and northwest Namibia, where women of the Himba tribe cover their skin and elaborately braided hair with a paste—otjize—made from ground ocher and butterfat.

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What makes a great travel photograph? Every year since 2003, the U.K.-based Travel Photographer of the Year competition has sought to define just that, recognizing international photographers whose images capture a fascinating glimpse of far-flung peoples and places. The works of the latest round of winners, which will be exhibited in the galleries of London’s Royal Geographical Society from July 24 to September 5, range from Ansel Adams–esque landscapes of Indonesia to gritty street photography in the Democratic Republic of Congo, from black-and-white portraits of a rural Chinese elderly community to color-saturated shots of cave diving in Mexico, each an example of the rare eye it takes to document a subject with a style. To see the full gallery of 2014’s award-winning images online, visit tpoty.com. —Gabrielle Lipton

This article originally appeared in the April/May print issue of DestinAsian magazine (“Pictures Perfect”)