Winner. “This was taken in the South Ari Atolls, Maldives, as the south-west monsoon season was setting in. It features my partner – and dive buddy – Emma after surfacing at the end of the last dive of the day to find 1.5 metre swells and dark monsoon clouds. MICK RYAN, JUDGE: This beautiful portrait of a diver in an ocean swell below a menacing sky stands out this month for its emotional and elemental beauty. It is a reminder that while we may play among nature we are always dwarfed by its power and must be constantly on our guard”. (Photo by Simon Dunn/The Guardian)

A performer dressed in costume prepares to participate in the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras parade in Sydney, Australia, March 5, 2016. The Sydney Mardi Gras parade began in 1978 as a march and commemoration of the 1969 Stonewall Riots of New York. It is an annual event promoting awareness of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender issues and themes. (Photo by David Gray/Reuters)

Members of indigenous Gurung community wearing traditional attire takes part with others in a New Year celebration ceremony known as “Tamu Lhosar” in Kathmandu on December 30, 2022. (Photo by Prakash Mathema/AFP Photo)

A woman tour skates on the frozen lake of Orlangen, south of Stockholm, Sweden, on December 23, 2016. Tour skating is recreational long distance ice skating on natural ice particularly popular in the Nordic countries. (Photo by Tobias Roestlund/AFP Photo/TT News Agency)

"Steve McCurry: India", co-organized by the Rubin Museum and the International Center of Photography, brings together photographs of India-its people, monuments, landscapes, seasons, and cities. The exhibition at the Rubin Museum in New York runs from November 18, 2015 – April 4, 2016. Here: A boy in mid-flight in Jodhpur, Rajasthan, India, in 2007. (Photo by Steve McCurry)

Children stand in a boat at the banks of the polluted Yamuna River during a dust haze as they wait to give a ride to worshippers in New Delhi during World Environment Day June 5, 2010. (Photo by Reinhard Krause/Reuters)

A police officer has weapons blessed by a Hindu priest during the Vishwakarma Puja festival in the outskirts of Agartala, India, September 17, 2016. (Photo by Jayanta Dey/Reuters)

Folk artists perform “iron flowers”, a folk art performance of throwing molten iron to create fireworks, in Daying County of Suining City, southwest China's Sichuan Province on January 26, 2023. (Photo by Xinhua News Agency/Rex Features/Shutterstock)