Akintunde Akinleye, 40, is the first Nigerian Photographer to have been awarded a prize in the prestigious World Press Photo, Netherlands in 2007 with an iconic photograph of a man rinsing soot from his face at the scene of an oil pipeline explosion in Lagos, December 2006. It was the beauty of a tragedy which claimed the lives of 269 people that made the official signage of the 19th edition of international photojournalism festival in perpignan, France in 2007.

An award fellow of the National Geographic Society- All Roads photo project, Akintunde has attended conferences and seminars in editorial and documentary photography in Ethiopia, Kenya, and Lagos. He has made presentations of his work and papers at the University of Stanford in the United States, Amsterdam and other major cities around the world. Since 2007, he has been a jury member of Friends of the Earth international photo competition, Netherlands. In June 2008, while attending a fellowship programme at the University of Texas in Dallas' artists' project, he produced a body of work that culminates oil production in Texas. He is also a resident fellow of the Thami Mnyele Art foundation in Amsterdam.

A master's degree holder in Educational Technology at the University of Lagos, Nigeria and a Postgraduate Diploma in Journalism at the Nigerian Institute of Journalism, Akintunde has had his work exhibited in Washington, Los Angeles, New Mexico, Lagos, Amsterdam, Graz, Bamako and Madrid. He had once been commissioned for assignments in Mauritania, Niger and Nigeria and currently pursue projects in African culture and tradition!

He lives in Lagos and works for Reuters in Nigeria.