(Biodiversity Conference) Ding Kuanliang, photographer of "Monkey King": Let the world see the "human beauty" of golden monkeys
China News Service, Kunming, October 15th, title: "Monkey King" photographer Ding Kuanliang: Let the world see the "human beauty" of golden monkeys
Author Xiong Jiaxin
"The capture and presentation, arrival and departure of every life light and shadow give us enlightenment. All I can do is to present their existence and life state with images." In the fifteenth session of the Convention on Biological Diversity On the occasion of the Conference of the Parties (COP15), photographer Ding Kuanliang brought photos of golden monkeys to Kunming to showcase the beauty of golden monkeys and promote the concept of protecting wild animals.
"Monkey King"
Ding Kuanliang, 62 years old this year, has been photographing golden monkeys since 1999. He has traveled almost all the golden monkey habitats in China. He has taken more than 500,000 photographs of golden monkeys in Sichuan, Yunnan, and Guizhou. He has been called the "Monkey King" by domestic and foreign photography circles. photographer.
Why Ding Kuanliang's lens loves golden monkeys so much? It starts from 33 years ago.
In 1988, Ding Kuanliang came across a group of migrating golden monkeys while passing through the Qinling Mountains.
Since then, these forest "elves" have become Ding Kuanliang's "good hearts".
Ding Kuanliang's current job is a bank clerk. His busy work made him take his camera back into the mountain after 11 years, and officially embarked on the road of "searching for monkeys", which lasted 22 years.
"The conditions for shooting golden monkeys in the inaccessible forests are very difficult, and they often encounter dangers such as getting lost and being attacked by wild animals." Despite this, Ding Kuanliang never thought of giving up, and kept learning photography skills, just to capture more precious moments of golden monkeys. .
"The golden monkey is agile and difficult to shoot. It requires a quick response within a few seconds and some luck." Ding Kuanliang said. He often squatted in the mountains for several days but it was difficult to see the golden monkey.
"Best Friend"
Over the years, Ding Kuanliang has taken many warm and lovely scenes of golden monkeys, and spread this "wild" warmth to all parts of the world through images.
Ding Kuanliang introduced to reporters, “The golden monkey is inseparable from its mother until the age of three. The female golden monkey always holds the cub in her arms.” In 2015, Ding Kuanliang photographed a Sichuan golden monkey cub and mother under two years old in Qinling. After a brief separation, he put his hands on his face and shouted like a person. He named this work "Hello, Mom".
"Hello, Mom" was selected into the "First Global Chinese Photography Art Exhibition" and won the 20th German International Nature Photography Award in 2018. It was exhibited in Canada, Germany and many other countries, attracting visitors from all over the world.
Ding Kuanliang hopes to use the power of images to call on more people to pay attention to nature, protect the ecological environment, and protect the habitats of rare wild animals from being destroyed.
At the northern foot of the Qinling Mountains, Ding Kuanliang listened to local villagers telling that when golden monkeys on the mountain occasionally visit, they "sensibly" never damage farmland and crops.
In Baima Snow Mountain, he saw the former hunter put down his shotgun and became a monkey guardian, and shouted and "talked" with the golden monkey.
Ding Kuanliang wrote in his diary: "When the golden monkeys can be a little more relaxed in the natural mountains and forests, perhaps their voices will merge with our (human) voices, showing the power and wisdom of life, and can play together. Triumph of natural civilization."
witness
Ding Kuanliang has become a communicator, protector and witness of Chinese golden monkeys in the habitat of golden monkeys in 22 years.
In recent years, China has set up nature reserves in the main habitats of golden monkeys in Sichuan, Yunnan, Guizhou, and Nujiang, established teams of forest rangers and monkey guards to prevent hunting and logging, and adopted measures such as returning farmland to forests in the periphery of the reserve to recover The overall ecology protects the habitat of golden monkeys.
According to the monitoring results, the population of various golden monkeys in China has increased significantly.
At present, the population of Sichuan golden snub-nosed monkeys in China has increased from 14,000 in 2002 to about 25,000 in 200 groups, with the increase in population distribution areas.
The population of Yunnan snub-nosed monkeys in China has increased from about 1,000 to 1,500 in 13 groups in 1996 to more than 3,300 in the current 23 populations.
Recently, Ding Kuanliang tried to post the captured golden monkey images to the short video platform, which was “liked” by many netizens.
After COP15, he will go to the mountains again to shoot. This time, Ding Kuanliang shifted the focus of shooting to the golden monkey dynamic video images, just to let more people see the agility and beauty of natural creatures in the wild.
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