Samuel James is a photographic artist and naturalist from southern Ohio. He began working with photography in Lagos, Nigeria, and his 2012 project, “The Water of My Land,” on the catastrophic effects of the oil industry in the Niger Delta, would define enduring themes of his work since then—survival and extinction, the beauty and brutality of nature, and the correlation between habitat and the human soul. More recently he has immersed himself in the forests of Appalachian Ohio, where he lives and works on a range of field biology, wildlife conservation and land stewardship projects to study and help preserve the biodiversity of this region.
He is the recipient of an International Center for Photography Infinity Award, the Overseas Press Club Olivier Rebbot Award, a Special Commendation from the Frontline Club of London, and a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship. His images of fireflies and spiders were featured in Werner Herzog’s film Theatre of Thought. His photographs have appeared in many international publications, including The New York Times, The Financial Times Magazine, Newsweek, and Harper’s Magazine, for which he has created extensive photo essays on topics including a sanctuary for wolf hybrids maintained by U.S. combat veterans, copper mining on sacred indigenous land in Arizona, and Leicester City F. C.’s unprecedented English Premier League title bid during the 2015/16 season.
His book, Nightairs, about the bioluminescent displays of fireflies, was named as one of the 2023 Best Dutch Photo Books and was shortlisted for the Paris Photo-Aperture First PhotoBook Prize. His work is in the permanent collections of Huis Van Het Boek in The Hague and the Cincinnati Museum Center’s Museum of Natural History & Science.
