Autumn Durald Arkapaw is the fourth woman to ever be nominated within the category.

Sinners cinematographer becomes first woman to ever win Oscars category

Autumn Durald Arkapaw is the fourth woman to ever be nominated within the category.

Joyce Eng

Joyce Eng is a senior news editor at ** with nearly 20 years of experience in entertainment journalism. She previously worked at OK!, TV Guide, and Gold Derby.

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March 15, 2026 10:43 p.m. ET

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Autumn Durald Arkapaw accepts the Best Cinematography award for 'Sinners' onstage during the 98th Oscars at Dolby Theatre on March 15, 2026. Credit:

Kevin Winter/Getty

Best Cinematography is officially no longer a boys' club.

*Sinners'* director of photography Autumn Durald Arkapaw made history at the 2026 Oscars by becoming the first woman to ever win the award for the category on Sunday, putting its 98-year-long streak of male winners to rest. Durald Arkapaw, the only woman in this year's race, was nominated in the category alongside Michael Bauman (*One Battle After Another*), Dan Laustsen (*Frankenstein*), Darius Khondji (*Marty Supreme*), and Adolpho Veloso (*Train Dreams*).

During her acceptance speech, Durald Arkapaw took a moment to shine a spotlight on all of the women in the audience and their contributions to cinema.

“I’m so honored to be here and I really want all the women in the room to stand up,” she said, “because I feel like I don’t get here without you guys. I really, really, truly mean that.”

Autumn Durald Arkapaw and Ryan Coogler on the set of 'Sinners'.

Warner Bros. Pictures

Durald Arkapaw continued, “I have felt so much love from all the women on this whole campaign and gotten to meet so many people and I just feel like moments like this happen because of you guys and I want to thank you for that.”

Introduced at the very first Oscars ceremony in 1929, Best Cinematography is the last long-running non-gendered category to award a woman. This year's new category, Best Casting, has already cracked the glass ceiling, with* One Battle After Another*'s Cassandra Kulukundis prevailing.

Perhaps just as shocking, if not more so, than the lack of a female DP winner is how long it took the Oscars to even nominate one. *Mudbound*'s Rachel Morrison became the first female nominee just eight years ago, a.k.a. in the 90th year of the Oscars. Durald Arkapaw is the fourth woman to be nominated in the category, following Ari Wegner (2021's *The Power of the Dog*) and Mandy Walker (2022's *Elvis*), and is the first woman of color nominee.

Autumn Durald Arkapaw attends the 98th Oscars at Dolby Theatre on March 15, 2026 in Hollywood, Calif.

Kevin Mazur/Getty

In an interview with IndieWire last month, Durald Arkapaw, who is the first woman to shoot a film in large-format IMAX with the Ryan Coogler vampire epic, said she has "of course" thought about making Oscar history as the first woman to win Best Cinematography.

"I would say I've allowed [myself to think about it] because it's something that I think [is] important for seeing women progress in my field," she told the outlet. "I think change is always good. And I say change with a big 'C' because there hasn't been a woman yet. If it hasn't happened yet, *why*? You don't want to wrap your head too much around it, because it hasn't happened for 97 years? There's a math number to that, that I looked up."

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Durald Arkapaw, who previously lensed Coogler's *Black Panther: Wakanda Forever*, appeared to be the one to beat at the start of the season late last year, collecting victories from a bevy of critics groups, including the prestigious New York Film Critics Circle and National Society of Film Critics, as well as the National Board of Review.

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Durald Arkapaw's nomination was one of a record-breaking 16 for *Sinners*. The Michael B. Jordan-led horror hit eclipsed the previous record of 14 nominations, which was shared by *All About Eve*, *Titanic*, and *La La Land*.

See the full list of 2026 Oscars winners here.

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