Anthony Ochieng Onyango

Growing up in Kenya, wildlife and nature were always part of my life. From drawing animals in a sketchpad as a boy in Nairobi and Kisumu, to chairing the Wildlife Club at Moi University, where I studied Wildlife Management, the natural world was never far from me. Nature was, and still is, my safe space. After years working inside conservation organisations on data, monitoring, and evaluation, I kept running into the same problem: the public didn’t understand what conservation really meant, and the people doing the work couldn’t communicate it visually. In 2016, I used my savings to take a photography course. It left a dent in my pockets, but my instincts told me it was the right investment. A year later, I bought my first real camera lens. It was the best day of my life. In 2017 I quit my job to commit fully to conservation photography. For two years I kept building even when freelance work was tight. I developed TonyWild, founded the TonyWild Foundation, and in 2019 landed my first major assignment. Since then, my work has taken me from the shores of Lake Jipe with elephants, to the depths of the Indian Ocean, to chimpanzee sanctuaries in Uganda, always with the same mission: to create images that make people care enough to act. I am also an underwater photographer and diver, I focuses on reshaping African narratives around the ocean, addressing fear-based perceptions of marine life and highlighting the ecological importance of sharks, coral reefs, and coastal ecosystems. My work has been published in The Guardian, National Geographic, BBC Earth, and CNN. I collaborate with NGOs, research institutions, educators, and Indigenous and local communities across Africa. In addition to storytelling, I contributes to conservation monitoring, evaluation, and research initiatives. My work centers on a core mission: to inspire conservation action by changing how people see and relate to nature.