Cyril Christo

Cyril Christo (born 11 May 1960) is a writer, photographer, filmmaker and animal rights activist residing in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He is the son of Christo Vladimirov Javacheff and Jeanne-Claude Denat de Guillebon, who are known as the artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude.

Early life and education
Born in France, he has lived in the United States since 1964. Christo studied at Cornell University and graduated from Columbia University in 1982.

Film work
Together with his wife Mary Wilkinson he has been engaged since 1996 in wildlife documentary projects and has published several photography books about Africa that call attention to endangered animals such as elephants, leopards, giraffes, and lions as well as appeals for more stricter measures to enforce the protection of whales and polar bears.

Their son Lysander (born 22 September 2005) has participated in their projects in East Africa from an early age. In 2007 they released a short documentary film titled "Lysander's Song" about the interactions between humans and elephants.

Cyril Christo is the co-producer of A Stitch for Time: The Boise Peace Quilt Project, which was nominated in 1998 for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. The film documents activities of a group of quilt makers in Boise, Idaho, who received international attention for promoting peace by sending a quilt in 1981 to the Soviet Union as well as making the National Peace Quilt in 1986 for display in the United States Senate and later deposit at the Smithsonian Institution.

The film Walking Thunder: Ode to the African Elephant about Lysander's encounter with elephants in East Africa was screened at the 2019 Taos Environmental Film Festival.

Publications

 * 1990: The dream of the Earth. E. Mellen Press, Lewiston. ISBN 088946846X
 * 1998: The whispering veils : Poems on Christo's art. Hugh Lauter Levin Associates, New York. ISBN 0883630230
 * 2004: Lost Africa: Eyes of Origin. Photographs and text by Cyril Christo and Marie Wilkinson. Assouline, New York City. ISBN 284323607X
 * 2004: Africa : la terre des origines (in French) ISBN 2843236436
 * 2009: Walking Thunder: In the Footsteps of the African Elephant. Merrell, London ISBN 1858945054
 * 2013: In Predatory Light: Lions and Tigers and Polar Bears. Merrell, London ISBN 1858946107
 * Forthcoming: Lords of the Earth: The entwined destiny  of  wildlife  and humanity, with a prologue by Jane Goodall