Renowned Minnesota wildlife photographer Jim Brandenburg dies at 79

Minnesota’s Jim Brandenburg, a giant among wildlife photographers, died Friday afternoon in Medina. He was 79.

A memorial was posted on his Facebook page Saturday morning, and news of his death moved quickly through the outdoors community.

Brandenburg was treated for anaplastic thyroid cancer the past seven months and also had been suffering from pneumonia, according to the post.

“Please hold his wife Judy, daughter Heidi and her husband Nels Pierson, grandchildren Olivia, Liam and Lindsey, and all those who loved Jim in your hearts by taking a walk in nature, looking up at the clouds and feel the transformation of Jim’s energy back into the Universe,” the post said.

The message also acknowledged the death of Brandenburg’s son Anthony on Feb. 24.

“He was the [Leonardo] da Vinci of wildlife photography,” said photographer Layne Kennedy of Minneapolis.

Kennedy knew Brandenburg for about 25 years, and like so many others who take their cameras afield, was inspired by him.

A native of Luverne, Minn., Brandenburg was known for his photographs that appeared in the pages of National Geographic and were collected in books such as “Chased by the Light” and “Brother Wolf: A Forgotten Promise.”

In 2023, he won the National Geographic Lifetime Achievement Award, an honor that he said was humbling.

“The Photo Society, comprised of two hundred of the magazine’s photographers spanning 3 generations, surprised me with this announcement,” he wrote on Facebook. “... I have been so very fortunate over the years to have received some precious and treasured awards around the world, but this one is unique for me because it is from my peers.”

Among other projects, Brandenburg launched a daily one-minute video project at nature365.tv in recent years. He also wrote and narrated a documentary, “Secrets from a Forest,” which played into 2024 at the Bell Museum planetarium in St. Paul.

“[His death] is heartbreaking,” former longtime Minnesota Star Tribune photographer Brian Peterson said. “He still was very active.”

Nature 365 collaborator Laurent Joffrion wrote on Saturday morning that Brandenburg “inspired so many of us with his understanding of nature. He moved so many souls with the poetry of his photographic and film work.”

Another former Star Tribune photographer, Tom Wallace, met Brandenburg as a teenager and worked with him for three years at the Worthington (Minn.) Daily Globe. Now 70, Wallace said they had rekindled their friendship in recent years.

“He was just the best,” Wallace said. “What he captured was magical. You look at his pictures, they are just so powerful in the art of the photo, the composition.”

Retired Duluth News Tribune journalist Sam Cook worked with Brandenburg as they covered Will Steger’s various polar expeditions for different outlets, spending time in the Northwest Territories before heading to the North Pole.

He said Brandenburg was “aggressive in a good way” to get the shots he wanted.

“He knew when caribou were likely to come over the rise, and he would be there,” Cook said. “He was in the right place at the right time because he knew when to be there.”

Grieving his friend’s passing, Kennedy said he’d been up all night thinking about how Brandenburg made him see photography in a new light.

“He humanized wildlife. He made us think about animals the way we think about friends,” he said.

“His photographs gave us something that went beyond behavior, beyond beauty, beyond struggle. He showed wildlife as shared partners on Earth. That is what he gave us.”

Jana Hollingsworth of the Minnesota Star Tribune contributed to this story.