Our Favorite VICE Photos of 2015

Photo by Curran Hatleberg from Lost Coast

Hi there, we’re Elizabeth and Matthew, VICE’s resident photography experts. Last year, we did a roundup of our favorite photos featured by VICE in 2014. We thought it was cool, and who doesn’t like looking at pictures, so we made another gallery of our faves from 2015. But, before the images commence, here is a quote from Thomas Roma, the renowned photographer who runs Columbia University’s photography program. It’s one of many moments of sage wisdom that was cut from our latest interview with Roma, and it captures one of the many reasons photography is so important to us.

“I don’t read a book constantly thinking about the author. Books I love I constantly relate to on my own—I think of myself, they’re part of my life. Same thing when you look at a film, it becomes part of your cultural, psychological, political experience. You go out in the world after seeing a certain film, you see the world a little differently. Read Beloved, you read Toni Morrison, and you think, all of a sudden everything looks different. Read The Catcher in the Rye when you’re young, all of a sudden you think differently. Art is supposed to raise your consciousness, if only temporarily.”

These are some of the photographs that changed our world in 2015.

Photo by Dru Donovan from Positions Taken

Photo by Martin Slepcik from Lunik IX Buds

Photo by Lara Shipley from Workampers

From Jason Lazarus’s ongoing project Too Hard to Keep

Photo by Zora J Murff from Corrections

Photo by Sohrab Hura from The Lost Head and the Bird

Photo by Kevin Zucker from Wintering

Photo by Pete Voelker from An Insignificant Impact

Photo by Michael Coles from Witness to a Massacre

Photo by Stacy Kranitz from her ongoing series Ain’t No Grave Gonna Hold my Body Down.

Photo by Juan Madrid from Catskill

Cover of The Earth Died Screaming Issue by Steve Smith

Photo by Manon Quérouil and Véronique de Viguerie from The Sand Looters

Photo by Andrew Litchtenstein’s series Life in Prison

‘After Marcel Duchamp’ by Anthony Costa, Jessica Frankl, Mikaela Keen Lumongsod, Frankie Mule, Gabrielia Priyma, Balazs Sebok, and Valeriya Vaynerman from Artsy Nudes

Photo by Michael Bailey-Gates from Angels

Photo by Matthew Leifheit from Leif: Boi Wonder

Photo by Elizabeth Renstrom from Fruit Salad with Laurie Anderson

Photo by Bryson Rand from The Love Trip

Portrait of Salman Rushdie by Michael Marcelle

Photo by Joseph Wolfgang Ohlert from Drag Queens of San Francisco

Photo by Jackson Krule from Thanksgiving Day Madness

Photo by Joseph Maida from A Place in the Sun: The Goth Scene in Hawaii

Photo by Mirka Laura Severa from her ongoing series King Bansah

From Jaimie Warren’s Horrorfest 2015

Photo by Lauren Poor fromPalo Alto Suicides

Photo by Eli Durst from Bowling

Photo by Nathan Bajar from Comic Con Two Ways

Photo by Bobby Scheidemann from Combustible Materials

Photo by Lindokuhle Sobekwa from Deep Hanging

Photo by Grey Hutton from Night Rooms

Photo by Meredith Talusan from How the Killing of a Trans Filipina Woman Ignited an International Incident

It Was Good to Get Out of the House Photo Requests from Solitary

Photo by Peter Van Agtmael from Home

Photo by Thomas Roma from In the Vale of Cashmere

Photo by Lijie Zhang from Portraits of Blind Children in Rural China

Photo by Robert Melee from Mommy

Tulips

Photo by Bieke Depoorter/Magnum Photos from Night Journeys in Sète

Photo by Jason Jaworski from his series Labyrinth

Photo by Irina Rozovsky from Salad Days

Photo by Michael Bühler-Rosefrom God Wallah

Photo by Maria Gruzdeva from Shooting the Edges

Photo by Maciek Pazoga from Uchronia

Photo by Annie Flanagan from Sweet Crude

Uganda Love This Issue cover by Frédéric Noy

Photo by Bruce Gilden from Two Days in Appalachia

Photo by Molly Matalon and Damien Maloney from The Wasting

Photo by Jen Davis from Women of the Arnold

Photo by Alec Soth from There’s No Place Like Nome

Photo by Jason Lazarus from Shrink

Photo by Eva O’Leary from Unnatural Nature

Photo by Josef Hoflehner from The Air Marshall

Elizabeth Renstrom is photo editor of VICE, and Matthew Leifheit is VICE’s photo editor-at-large. See more photos we love here, updated daily.