.png){kind=logo}
1 day ago
5
In a world flooded with color, black and white photography still hits different. In best of 2025, photographers from every corner of the globe proved that stripping an image down to light, shadow, and emotion can be more powerful than any saturated palette. These 35 award-winning black and white photos didn’t just win trophies—they stopped time, pulled at heartstrings, and told stories that words couldn’t touch.
Across major international photography competitions, artists submitted their strongest monochrome work, competing in categories ranging from documentary and street photography to wildlife, portraiture, and fine art. What united these winners wasn’t style or subject—it was impact. Black and white forced the eye to focus on the essentials: a glance, a gesture, a moment hanging in the air. No distractions. No shortcuts.
Some images capture raw human emotion—grief, resilience, joy—etched in faces shaped by experience. Others freeze decisive moments on the street, where geometry, contrast, and timing align in a split second of visual poetry. Wildlife photographers used monochrome to amplify drama, turning fur, feathers, and movement into bold graphic statements. In fine art and conceptual categories, light and shadow became tools of abstraction, transforming ordinary scenes into something unforgettable.
What makes this collection special is its global voice. These photographs come from photographers working across continents, cultures, and environments, each bringing a unique perspective while speaking a universal visual language. Black and white becomes the common ground—a timeless medium that refuses to age.
The best black and white photos of 2025 remind us why monochrome still matters. When color disappears, truth steps forward. And in these 35 striking images, truth looks absolutely stunning.
#1. Exposure One Awards – International Photographer of the Year: "Lux" by Arturo Gómez Sierra
"Light descends in perfect symmetry, converging on a silent cross. Visual artist based in Mexico. With a background in Digital Art, his work reflects a deep love for experimentation, visual storytelling and introspection. Known for a signature style that blends aesthetics and spirituality."
#2. Exposure One Awards – Film/Analog Photographer of the Year: "Where the Wild Things Are" by David Zlotky
"I made these photographs with my 4×5 view camera on sheet film. They represent the beauty and mystery to be found in the quiet places of Colorado and Wisconsin. When I photograph these natural cathedrals, I feel as if I’ve heard whispered secrets that I can only share through the lens of my camera."
#3. Exposure One Awards – Fine Art Photographer of the Year: "Sugar Gallery" by Jozef Danyi
"Inspired by the form of a sugar loaf, this fine art portrait explores themes of purity, anonymity, and tradition. The sculptural fabric conceals and reveals, evoking sweetness, silence, and introspection through a minimalist, surreal lens."
#4. Exposure One Awards – Nature Photographer of the Year: "Vulture perched on a log during the rain" by Fabrício Peixoto Da Silva Mello
#5. LensCulture Black & White Photography Awards – Series Winner – 1st Place: "Buzkashi" by Todd Antony
"Buzkashi, which translates to “goat pulling” in Persian, is the wild, brutal sport of Tajikistan shared by its neighboring countries. Think polo—but with a headless, eviscerated goat standing in as a ball, hundreds of riders, and no formal teams. Rooted in the nomadic cultures of Central Asia and played for hundreds of years, riders, or ‘chapandaz,’ battle for control of the goat while dodging rivals, and the occasional whip or elbow."
#6. LensCulture Black & White Photography Awards – Series Winner – 2nd Place: "You Can’t Enter the Same River Twice" by Francisco Gonzalez Camacho
"This project explores the concept of impermanence, the futility of becoming and the landscape as an agent of transformation. An unknowable rhythm unfolds; forms bend, break, emerge, dissolve, neither whole nor undone. Traces persist within the drift; shifting patterns, unfixed entities, hidden layers of impermanence lie beneath.
Nothing holds. Nothing stays. Growth and ruin intertwine—a pulse of becoming and unraveling, between absence and presence, the landscape in flux. The surface fractures, shifts, unseen forces, all caught in the current, fleeting, surrendering to the flow—panta rhei, everything flows."
#7. LensCulture Black & White Photography Awards – Series Winner – 3rd Place: "Dancing Your Dream Awake" by Anita Andrzejewska
"This is a visual journey through space and time, inspired by the idea of life as pilgrimage. The book’s motto, a quote from Rainer Maria Rilke’s The Book of Hours, speaks of venturing to the limits of one’s longing to discover life and experience all it has to offer: both beauty and terror."
#8. LensCulture Black & White Photography Awards – Single Winner – 1st Place: "Patience" by Kartikeya Manan
"A man hangs onto an open window in search of some respite from the mid-summer heat of an overcrowded bus. This photographs comes from a project that explores the daily commute of public transport users in New Delhi."
#9. LensCulture Black & White Photography Awards – Single Winner – 2nd Place: "Silent Dialogue" by Nina Hauben
"This project marks a slow shift—a passage from stillness to life. The boundaries between memory and reality begin to dissolve; absence takes on form and silence becomes a language of its own."
#10. Monochrome Photography Awards – 1st Place Winner: "Between 2 worlds" by Merche Llobera, Spain
"In this image, the duality of the hunt is captured: above, a group of pelicans launches from the sky in a coordinated dance, seeking their prey. Meanwhile, beneath the water’s surface, a frenzy of marine activity unfolds: a bustling shoal of sardines surrounded by sea lions and mahi-mahi, each immersed in their search for food treat. Baja California Sur, Mexico."
#11. Monochrome Photography Awards – 2nd Place Winner: "Through the legs" by Baiju Patil, India
"This photo was taken by Jim Corbett at a that you’ve been visiting the park regularly for 10-15 days. It sounds like Jim Corbett National Park is a fantastic location for wildlife photography, especially for capturing elephants and tigers in their natural habitat. Your description of the park’s rich and beautiful environment, particularly in April, is vivid and enticing."
#12. Monochrome Photography Awards – 3rd Place Winner: "Look back" by Min Li
"The wild beast of the forest haunt the night, It’s shadow reflected in the water."
#13. Mobile Photography Awards – 1st Place Winner: "Freedom" by Roy Pan
#14. Mobile Photography Awards – "The Bench with Shadow Dog" by Tony Hertz
#15. Mobile Photography Awards – "Canopy Jigsaw" by Sally Kent
#16. Black and White Photo Awards – Absolute Winner: "The kingdom of flies" by João Coelho
"The Absolute Winner of the Black and White Photo Awards 2025 is João Coelho, with his photograph The kingdom of flies. The photograph, which portrays how harsh survival can be in some countries, has won the title of Black and White Photographer of the Year 2025, with €1,000 courtesy of SanDisk and a magnificent Simera 35mm f1.4 lens (E/RF/Z/X)."
#17. Black and White Photo Awards – Runner-Up: "Where the shadows lie" by Mark Seawell
"Where the shadows lie, by Mark Seawell, was the first photograph to be named Runner-Up in the Black and White Photo Awards. The sophisticated and highly complex interplay of light and shadow not only stood out from the rest of the images, but also won a Benro Tortoise TTOR24CGX30 carbon tripod kit + Tenba backpack Axis V2 20L."
#18. Black and White Photo Awards – Special Award for Creativity by SanDisk: "Electric Silhouette" by Adebayo Rotilu
"This year, the Special Award for Creativity, an amazing SanDisk Professional PRO-G40 SSD (4TB), goes to Adebayo Rotilu for his photograph Electric Silhouette. A unique portrait that uses only laser beams as the main light source before converting it to black and white."
#19. Black and White Photo Awards – Special Award Master of Light by Godox: "No Words" by Roberto Corinaldesi
"The first Special Award Master of Light, awarded with an AD600ProII flash, by Godox, went to Roberto Corinaldesi. The energy captured in his photograph No Words and the way it is lit led this photographer to be the first to win this award."
#20. Black and White Photo Awards – Landscape Winner: "The Wedded Rocks" by Robert Bolton
#21. Monovisions Photography Awards – 1st Place Winner: "Riders of the Volcano" by Mahendra Bakle
"The Horsemen of Bromo," epitomize a rich cultural legacy amidst Mount Bromo’s breathtaking landscape. are custodians of tradition, they provide visitors an immersive journey, blending vibrant customs with deep-rooted rituals, offering rides and a profound encounter with the region’s heritage.
#22. Monovisions Photography Awards — 2nd Place Winner: "Mundari cattle camp" by Svetlin Yosifov
"In the Mundari cattle camps, kids are doing most of the daily work. Kids collect the fresh cow dung and put it into piles which are then set on fire. Those fire are useful as they repel the (extremely) numerous and voracious flies and mosquitoes of the South Sudanese countryside. The Mundari also use the ash created by these fires to rub on themselves and their cattle, creating a protection against mosquitoes."
#23. Monovisions Photography Awards – 3rd Place Winner: "Rays of Tranquility" by Partha Roy
"Bathed in ethereal morning light, an ancient tree stands as the centerpiece of life, its branches casting intricate shadows on the earth below. A shepherd tends to their flock while a horse-drawn cart adds to the timeless charm of the scene. This black-and-white portrayal captures the quiet harmony of rural existence, illuminated by nature’s artistry."
#24. Monovisions Photography Awards – "Cutest schoolgirls" by Amal Alameer
"The picture shows a school in the Kargil region in the high Himalayas of India. The residents are well educated despite the area being almost isolated from civil society. They learn more than one language in addition to science and mathematics."
#25. AAP Magazine Awards – 1st Place Winner: "Balance" by Astrid Verhoef, Netherlands
"The artwork ‘Balance’ was shot in March 2025, at the beautiful Peninsula de Jandia, Fuerteventura, Spain. For all my artwork I’m exploring my relationship and connection to the natural world, usually portraying a figure that always seems to linger somewhere between the natural and an artificial element preventing her from truly connecting. Like a trace from the world she can’t leave behind."
#26. AAP Magazine Awards – 2nd Place Winner: "Harder Lives" by Antonio Denti, Italy
"Souvenir makers at work on the edge of the Sahara Desert, as in the small town near-by their families live on. ”Harder Lives” is part of a wider project called ”Everything and Nothing” that tries to capture the moving essence of the little lives – our little lives – in the backdrop of the global economy and of a massive new industrial revolution in very different settings. In this case a small village in Morocco that used to live off very little (dates, palms, small herding, minor caravans) and now shifted to global tourism as all kinds of people travel there from all places in the world to see the magic marvels of the Sahara."
#27. AAP Magazine Awards – 3rd Place Winner: "People I Know" by Lynne Breitfeller, United States
"This image, “Stacy and Miss Kitty”, is from “People I Know”, a collection of portraits, created in the early to mid-nineties of friends, family, and acquaintances. Some are candid, and others are performative. These photos bring me back to earlier times and help me visualize my early adult years and how people come in and out of our lives, and how some stay. Each holds a place in the catalog of my memory."
#28. B&W Street Macadam Awards – 1st Prize: Eddy Verloes
#29. B&W Street Macadam Awards – 2nd Prize: Frank Proost
#30. B&W Street Macadam Awards – 3rd Prize: Mariana Basurto
#31. Artist Gallery Awards – 1st Place: "Winter Attack" by Michiko Otomo, Canada
"People enjoyed a night walk without suffering from a snowstorm. This photo was taken at Place d’Armes in Old Quebec City, Canada."
#32. Artist Gallery Awards – 2nd Place: "Lunch Break at the Orphanage" by Allan Syphers, USA
"The cook takes his lunch break in the very primitive kitchen at The Mukaa Children’s Orphanage in Mukaa, Kenya."
#33. Artist Gallery Awards – 3rd Place: "Life of Sumba" by Jeff Baus, Luxembourg
"This picture shows us a typical scene from the life of the Sumbanese."
#34. Monochrome Photography Awards – 1st Place Winner: "Black woodpecker flying through the trees" by Zdeněk Vošický, Czech Republic
"Black woodpecker flying between the trunks of an old tree in the autumn mood of Slavkov Park."
#35. Monochrome Photography Awards – 2nd Place Winner: "Aquatic Flame" by Juan Carlos Pinto, Mexico
"This image taken in the moat of the imperial palace in Tokyo shows a swan floating on the dark surface of a moat, viewed from above. Its neck curves back along its body, creating a shape that resembles a white flame. The scene evokes the principles of ma—the beauty of space and stillness—and wabi-sabi, the appreciation of impermanence and simplicity."
English (US) ·