TLDR: Israeli photographer Ilan Shacham has won the ‘Abstract Landscape’ category of the Natural Landscape Photography Awards for his stunning Dead Sea image, ‘Salty Pearls.’ The competition strictly prohibited AI-generated content and emphasized authentic photography, highlighting a growing trend in the industry to celebrate human artistry over digital manipulation.
In a significant win for traditional photography and human creativity, Israeli landscape photographer Ilan Shacham has been awarded first place in the ‘Abstract Landscape’ category of the prestigious Natural Landscape Photography Awards. His captivating image, titled ‘Salty Pearls,’ captured at the Dead Sea, stood out in a competition that explicitly outlawed the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in submissions.
The Natural Landscape Photography Awards are known for their stringent emphasis on authenticity, allowing only minimal editing and directly contrasting with the increasing prevalence of AI and heavy digital manipulation in contemporary photography. This stance underscores a broader movement within the photography community to preserve the integrity of human-captured and crafted images.
Shacham, a self-taught photographer residing in Modi’in with his wife and three children, expressed his deep connection to the Dead Sea. “The Dead Sea is one of my favorite areas to photograph,” Ilan told Ynet. “I am always amazed by the variety of salt formations, which create an impressive range of shapes and textures. It is particularly rich material for anyone seeking to express the world in an abstract way, like a painting of nature.” He described the winning shot, ‘Salty Pearls,’ as being taken on a winter morning on an anonymous northern Dead Sea beach, where he discovered ‘salt pearls’ illuminated by the low sun, creating a magnificent texture of spheres within glowing lines.
This is not Shacham’s first international recognition. His work has previously been featured in National Geographic magazines and Lonely Planet guidebooks. In 2011, he was a winner in the National Geographic Traveler world photography competition, and in 2017, one of his images was exhibited at the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, D.C., after receiving an honorable mention in the Nature’s Best Photography competition. He also earned an honorable mention at the Natural Landscape Photography Awards in 2021 for his piece ‘Nature’s Clock,’ depicting a lone plant on an Icelandic beach.
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The prohibition of AI in such high-profile competitions reflects a critical discussion within the art world about the role of technology. While AI tools offer new creative avenues, many purists and traditionalists advocate for competitions that celebrate the photographer’s direct interaction with the subject and their skill in capturing and processing an image without generative AI interference. Another prominent competition, the International Landscape Photographer of the Year Awards, also explicitly states, ‘No AI-generated images are allowed,’ reinforcing this industry-wide commitment to authentic photographic art. The International Landscape Photographer of the Year Awards, currently in its twelfth year, offers US$12,500 in cash prizes and aims to publish the top 101 photographs in an annual book, with entries for the 2025 awards closing on October 7, 2025.
