Juanita Escobar is a Colombian documentary photographer who has been living in and exploring the vast Orinoco savannas since 2009. Her working method is rooted in ethnography. Through her photography, she explores the human landscape: a geography inhabited by emotions and identities. This relationship between people and their geography resonates in her stories and portraits. She has been a National Geographic Explorer since 2023 and was awarded a grant to complete a long-term, archaeology-focused project on the Orinoco. She is also a 2018 Magnum Foundation Fund grantee and winner of the 2009 Colombo-Swiss National Photography Award. She has authored five books, including three photobooks — “Llano” (2017), “Orinoco: Water Frontier” (2019) and “Only Suitable for Myself” (2022). Her stories have been published in print media such as GEO and Der Spiegel, as well as in digital media such as The New Yorker, The Nation, and National Geographic’s Proof. In 2024, she held a solo exhibition at the Bronx Documentary Center in New York, showcasing Orinoco's complete body of work from 2015 to 2023.

Photo by Luca Zanetti