Lennart Nilsson Award for outstanding photography of the world of insects

Mr Kuribayashi was selected as this year’s prize-winner because of the photographic techniques he pioneered to photograph the world of the insect in a new and unique method.

Using humour, empathy, beauty and unsurpassed precision he depicts both the insects themselves and their environments in fascinating video and still imagery. His images provide a new perspective on one of the Earth’s many ecosystems where human beings and insects prove to have unexpectedly much in common.

Satoshi Kuribayashi, 67, has worked as a freelance photographer since the 1960s. Since those beginnings, he has published no less than 40 books and films, all focusing on insect ecology. Kuribayashi’s unique methods are based largely on his skills in designing and fabricating optical devices and other photographic equipment required to both examine and capture imagery at the magnification required to accomplish this work. One of his innovations includes a medical instrument to which he has fitted a lens of only three millimetres in diameter. His most recent publications include the book In Front of the Ant and the film Universe Among the Grass.

The Lennart Nilsson Award was founded in 1998 with one of its objectives to recognize the work of the world-renown Swedish photographer for which the award is named. The prize awarded annually is given to someone who similarly to Nilsson, works in ways that furthers the discipline of scientific photography and reveals what was previously unknown.

The Award of SEK 100,000 (around 13,500 USD), will be presented in Berwaldhallen in Stockholm, Sweden on the second of November 2006. The occasion will also host the annual installation of Professors at the Karolinska Institutet, Sweden’s largest medical training and research centre and the home of the Nobel Assembly. Dr Nilsson will be present at the ceremony.