"The scene, though macabre, inspired me," says French underwater photographer Gaël Modrak. That instinct – to pause, to look deeper, to reach for a wide-angle lens where others might have turned away – produced one of the most quietly devastating images in this year's Close Up Photographer of the Year 'Death & Decay' challenge.
Modrak's image, Dead Chick of the Pond, shows the body of a waterfowl chick lying on the floor of a pond in Viry-Châtillon, on the southern outskirts of Paris. Shot entirely underwater, the image is remarkable not for shock value, but for its atmosphere. Ghostly light rays filter down through the murky green water above the tiny, still body, lending the scene what Modrak himself describes as a "mystical, almost reverential quality."
