TITLE: Transfer of Wisdom

Elephants are amazingly sensitive, intelligent and gentle beings, with strong social bonds and family ties. While there are many things that we love about spending time with elephant herds, the most memorable ones have been mother child or adult juvenile interactions. Quite often these moments are about the adult schooling the youngster about some aspect of life, such as how to behave with safari vehicles or other herd members.

This morning, while we were photographing a herd at Kenya's Amboseli National Park, a younger elephant walked up to an adult and they shared a long interaction where they just stood next to each other, trunks barely touching. The whole scene seemed almost mystical to us and we were convinced that there definitely was some transfer of elephant wisdom taking place!

AUTHOR: Preeti and Prashant Chacko (India)

We are Preeti and Prashant Chacko, Indian photo artists. Together, we go by the handle “Composing the Wild”. Our work celebrates nature through the beauty of its wild animals, photographed in timeless black and white. We favour monochrome for its ability to distil emotion and to create a vision of a time past but hopefully never lost.

What inspires us is not just the visual drama of the wild, but the emotion it stirs. Over years of photography, we’ve learned that the images we cherish most are those that express beauty and emotion. Through our lens, we try to portray the grace of the wild and invite viewers to see these beings not as beasts, but as wonders worthy of awe, empathy, and protection.