Tender embrace of two penguins wins photography prize

The photograph that captured the moment when two penguins hugged each other, in Australia, through the lens of Tobias Baumgaertner was awarded in Oceanographic magazine.

Oceanographic magazine annually organizes the “Ocean Photograph Awards”, which are divided into different categories. German photographer Tobias Baumgaertner won the category of “Community Choice Award” (prize chosen by the public), with the photograph of two penguins that seem to be consoling themselves, after having lost their companions, in the city of Melbourne, Australia .

When we look at the image of the male consoling the white female, the typical gesture of placing a hand on another person’s back to comfort him comes to mind when he feels sad. The volunteers at St Kilda Pier, Melbourne’s tourist attraction, where you can see penguins, told the photographer that animals are often so clutched. “A volunteer approached me and told me that the white woman was an elderly woman who had lost her partner and, apparently, the youngest man on the left too,” he wrote on Instagram.

The colony is guarded by several volunteers and is home to around 1,400 fairy penguins, the smallest species in the world at 33 cm, reports the BBC. Initially the idea was to capture a photo that showed the pressure of human development on animals, but “this image is much more than that, it communicates union and love”. “The truly lucky ones are those who can be with those they love,” reads the contest’s website.

The penguins were watching the city lights in the moonlight, sitting on a rock. At the end of a three-hour wait, Baumgaertner felt lucky to witness the moment and have managed to register it for the world to see. “Between not being able to use any lights and the little penguins in continuous movement, rubbing their fins on each other’s backs and cleaning each other, it was really difficult to get a photo,” he says.

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