Jo-Anne McArthur
Jo-Anne McArthur is a Toronto-based photojournalist and creator of We Animals Media, an ambitious project that documents, through photography, animals in the human environment. Jo-Anne received four CAF grants to allow her to pursue her work. From 2017 to 2021, Jo-Anne was on the board of the Culture & Animals Foundation.
Jo-Anne’s work has been featured in many books and publications such as National Geographic, Elle Canada, Canadian Geographic, DAYS Japan, Helsingin Sanomat, Photolife, PDN Online, The Huffington Post, Earth Island Journal, Point of View, Alternatives Journal and Canadian Dimension. She has been awarded a range of commendations for her photography and activism, including several commendations in the Wildlife Photographer of the Year awards and joint first place in the COP26 photography competition.
Jo-Anne has written or edited four books: We Animals (2013/rev. 2022), Captive, HIDDEN: Animals in the Anthropocene (co-edited with Keith Wilson), and The Animals Are Leaving Us (with words by Martin Rowe). She is the subject of Canadian filmmaker fellow CAF grantee Liz Marshall’s acclaimed documentary The Ghosts In Our Machine. Other awards and accolades include the Institute for Critical Animal Studies Media Award, More Magazine’s Fierce List, 2013 Toronto Compassion for Animals Award, one of CBC’s Top 50 Champions of Change, Farm Sanctuary’s 2010 “Friend of Farm Animals” award, HuffPost WOMEN’s “Top 10 Women trying to change the world”, and one of 20 activists featured in the book The Next Eco Warrior.
Jo-Anne continues to tour the world through We Animals Media, bringing attention to the plight of animals and promoting the concept and practice of animal photojournalism (APJ). In 2023, she visited Zimbabwe and interviewed 2020 grantee Linda Ncube and 2022 grantee Alfred Sihwa on their work.