Andrew Parkinson, animal behaviour category winner: Crepuscular Contentment, Derbyshire. “In 15 years of working with badgers I’ve never seen a badger sit out in the open to have a scratch. I was sat concealed behind a tree and downwind so it was especially nice that the badger had his back to me, demonstrating just how inconspicuous and inconsequential my presence was”. (Photo by Andrew Parkinson/British Wildlife Photography Awards 2017)

A large balloon of a face of “ojisan”, a middle aged man, floats in the sky above the grounds of Nishiki elementary school in Utsunomiya in Tochigi prefecture, 100km north of Tokyo on December 21, 2014. Members of art group “Me”, meaning “eye” in Japanese and the Utsunomiya Museum of Art launched an art installation “The Day an Ojisan's Face Floated in the Sky”, a 15-meter by 10-meter face balloon of the depicted man, who was auditioned in the city, looking down on his home town from the sky. (Photo by Yoshikazu Tsuno/AFP Photo)

“They’ve been obsessing me for years. I searched and found them in Benares, on the banks of the river Gange (India). They arrive here to get rid of everything and to wait for death. This existence can last for years, sometimes decades, almost a life. Opposite to mine, well organised and filled as a human life can be, to try in vain to push the limits of its end”. – Denis Rouvre. (Photo by Denis Rouvre)

I would like to tell you why many artists, who like me, have painted portraits and landscapes in oils on canvas, worked with acrylics, watercolors, and pen and ink drawings, have turned to the art of gourd carving.

“I have been photographing this group of urban foxes in Bristol for over 12 months; what started off as a chance encounter has become an obsession for me and has changed my feelings and attitudes towards urban foxes forever...”. – Ian Wade. (Photo by Ian Wade)

People spray water in the street ahead of “Songkran”, the annual Thai New Year water-throwing festival, in Kowloon City, Hong Kong, China, 09 April 2017. The pouring of water is a key element in the festival as it represents purification and the washing away of one's sins and bad luck for the year. The event also includes a “Miss Songkran” pageant where contestants are clothed in traditional Thai dress, and a winner is crowned. This year's “Songkran” will begin in Thailand on 13 April 2017. (Photo by Alex Hofford/EPA)

In this April 13, 2015 file photo, a Thai woman splashes water on people from the back of a truck during the Songkran water festival to celebrate Thai New Year in Bangkok, Thailand.Thailand's military government is putting a dampener on the annual nationwide water fight. Despite Thailand's worst drought in 20 years, the junta says it has no intention of limiting the virtually around-the-clock water throwing that defines the three-day Songkran festival. Instead, it has decided to impose morality measures. (Photo by Sakchai Lalit/AP Photo)

Aymara witchdoctor Ricardo Quispe, also called “Lord of the Lake”, throws coca leaves during a ritual to predict the future, at the witches market of El Alto, on the outskirts of La Paz, December 31, 2014. Dozens of witch doctors tend to a warren of stalls in El Alto, making offerings to give thanks, to promise luck at work or in love, or to call up spirits and banish curses at the end of the year. (Photo by David Mercado/Reuters)