About
b. 1985, USA. I am a Washington, D.C.-based multimedia journalist from Atlanta, Georgia.
In 2008, I graduated from Georgia College & State University with a BA in Fine Art. I attended The Aegean Center for the Fine Arts in Paros, Greece, in 2011, where I focused on photography and fine art inkjet printing. Five years later, I returned to The Aegean Center for a brief residency.
In 2006, while photographing my mother's fight against a brain tumor and the physical and mental handicaps that came with it, I witnessed how images can usher viewers into the lives of people in a way that is not possible through text. That is why today, I am particularly interested in documenting the stories of marginalized, displaced, and underrepresented communities, from refugees fleeing their homes in the Middle East to America's ongoing fight against racial injustices. Photojournalism is a window that can give voice to the suffering or unheard and shape a better way forward, from the geopolitical to social structures.
In 2016 and 2017, I lived in Iraqi Kurdistan as a freelance photojournalist and worked with an organization documenting aid to the region's displaced. Chronicling forcibly displaced people matters because these mass migrations disproportionately and unjustly impact the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people. It is inherently unsustainable that nations who cannot provide for their own should do so also for those who are not. And the uprooted hosted by the wealthiest nations, particularly America, are confronted with over 200 years of systemic racism and over-prosecution compounded by politically motivated aggression against not only their safety but value as human beings.
In the spring of 2018, I drove from San Francisco to New York City on a three-month project photographing American Journeys, with journalist and writer Katy Long, telling stories of a nation of immigrants. To learn more, visit the Overseas Development Institute blog here.