UPY 2025

UPY  Save our Seas Foundation Marine Conservation - Commended
'Caught by'
Klaudyna Brzostowska

This is the story of a bycatch. The trawler comes back to Port d'Andratx in the island of Mallorca after a day at sea. Bottom trawling is a fishing practice that captures the target species like shrimps, squids, and crabs by towing a net along the ocean floor. The net scoops the sea floor and takes everything on its way. Including this critically endangered school shark (Galeorhinus galeus). It was saddening to witness this distruction. A crowd gathered around the boat, people bargaining for fresh seafood while various shark species are being hosed down back into the sea, as there is little value in shark meat on the local market. As a European, little did I know that such practices occur legally in our backyard. Photographically I wanted to highlight the intimacy and minimalism in the frame to underline the grand issue of a bycatch.

Judge's comment: A really powerful picture speaking the wastefulness of discarded bycatch. An eye-catching composition that is ready made for a campaign poster, backed up with details such as the gasping mouth of the dead shark and the stain down the side of the boat revealing this is anything but a one-off occurrence.
Alex Mustard