We were honored to have the following Judges for our 2011 Activist Awards:
KEITH JENKINS
Keith Jenkins came to NPR in July 2008 as the Supervising Senior Producer for Multimedia. In this role he oversees the multimedia unit of NPR.org, responsible for the photography and videography throughout the site. Keith and his staff work with NPR shows, reporters and editors on reporting projects providing compelling visuals to match the rich audio storytelling of NPR.
Among the daily photography and editing duties, Keith and his team work to create the visual components for NPR special series, such as: One Hundred Days: On the Road in Troubled Times, ‘America’s Battalion’ in Afghanistan, The York Project: Race & The ’08 Vote, Traveling Down the Amazon Road andAlong the Grand Trunk Road: Coming of Age in India and Pakistan.
Keith spent 13 years at The Washington Post working in a variety of capacities. He served as a staff photographer and photography director of washingtonpost.com, photography editor of The Washington Post Magazine and deputy assistant managing editor for photography at the newspaper.
From 1997 to 1999, Keith worked as AOL’s first director of photography. He began his photography career working for the graphic designer Dietmar R. Winkler and then spent five years as a staff photographer for The Boston Globe.
Acclaim for Keith’s work as a photographer and editor has come from the National Press Photographers Association; White House News Photographers Association; Radio and Television Correspondents’ Association; University of Missouri; Society of News Design; the Society of Publication Designers; and the Art Director’s Clubs of New York, Boston, and Washington. In 2007, Keith was the photo editor on The Washington Post’s Pulitzer Prize-winning series on Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
Throughout his career, Keith has given lectures and presentations on photography and multimedia at schools and organizations including the New England School of Photography, Rhode Island School of Design, The Poynter Institute, University of Miami and American Press Institute. He currently teaches multimedia as an adjunct professor at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.
Keith is a graduate of Brandeis University and the Boston University School of Law.
AMI VITALE
Ami Vitale’s journey as a photojournalist has taken her to more than 75 countries. She has witnessed civil unrest, poverty, destruction of life, and unspeakable violence. But she has also experienced surreal beauty and the enduring power of the human spirit, and she is committed to highlighting the surprising and subtle similarities between cultures. Her photographs have been exhibited around the world in museums and galleries and published in international magazines including National Geographic, Adventure, Geo, Newsweek, TIME, and Smithsonian.
Ami’s work has garnered multiple awards from prestigious organizations including World Press Photos, the Lowell Thomas Award for Travel Journalism, Lucie Awards, the Daniel Pearl Award for Outstanding Reporting, and the Magazine Photographer of the Year award, among many others.
Now based in Montana, Ami is a contract photographer with National Geographic magazine and frequently gives workshops throughout the Americas, Europe and Asia. She is also making a documentary film on migration in Bangladesh and writing a book about the stories behind the images.
BARBARA KINNEY
Barbara Kinney is an award-winning photojournalist whose photographs have been published on the covers of TIME, Newsweek and People magazines. She was a staff photographer at the White House during the administration of President William J. Clinton. Her photograph of President Clinton and the leaders of the Middle East straightening their ties before an event won her a prestigious First Place for “People in the News” in the World Press Photo competition.
Barbara spent five months traveling with Hillary Clinton during her bid for President in 2008. She was given unprecedented access as Clinton’s personal campaign photographer, documenting the historical race for the Democratic presidential nomination. As a result of her continuing work and relationship with the Clinton family, they selected her as a wedding photographer for daughter Chelsea Clinton’s marriage to Marc Mezvinsky in July 2010.
Barbara has traveled with various foundations and nonprofit groups documenting their work around the world. She has photographed the Mobility Project distributing wheelchairs in Afghanistan, Operation Smile during a trip to Nairobi, Kenya, maternal health care in Tanzania with CARE, a Congressional delegation traveling to West Africa with former President Clinton and the Clinton Foundation, and to the Democratic Republic of Congo with Ben Affleck and his newly created Eastern Congo Initiative. She has traveled on various trips with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation photographing their leadership team and grantees in Mozambique, South Africa, Malawi, India and Mexico.
Her work has appeared in many newspapers and magazines around the world and she was among a select group of photographers who worked on A Day in the Life of the American Woman and A Day in the Life of the U.S. Armed Forces book projects.
Additionally, Barbara has worked as a photo editor on staff at USA Today, Reuters, The Seattle Times and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Barbara was born and raised in Evansville, Indiana and attended Harrison High School. She graduated with a degree in photojournalism from the University of Kansas. She is currently based in Seattle, Washington.
CHRIS RAINIER
Chris Rainier is a National Geographic Society Fellow who has spent his career documenting endangered cultures and traditional language loss. He received the Lowell Thomas Award by the Explorers Club for his efforts on cultural preservation in 2002, and has been recently elected a Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society of London.
At National Geographic Society, Chris has been the Co-Founder and present Co-Director of both the Enduring Voices Language Preservation Project and the All Roads Photography Program (which supports Indigenous groups desiring to document their own traditional language and culture). He has completed projects for The United Nations, UNESCO, Amnesty International, Conservation International, Smithsonian Institution, TIME Magazine, The New York Times, and the National Geographic Society. Chris lectures throughout the world on ancient stories and traditional culture.
VALENDA CAMPBELL
Valenda Campbell is the director of photography and manager of the brand and creative productions teams for CARE, a leading global humanitarian organization. Working with photographers around the world, she conceives and directs photo commissions that put a human face on global poverty, while connecting donors and the public to CARE’s work. Valenda also serves as the global organization’s in-house expert on the most compelling and ethical use of images to represent their work and engage supporters.
As a photographer, Valenda has documented CARE’s poverty fighting projects in Burundi, Cambodia, Guatemala, India, Malawi, Mali, Peru, Sierra Leone, and Thailand. In 2004, she created CARE’s partnership with award-winning portrait photographer and humanitarian Phil Borges to develop the “Women Empowered Project.” The documentary project, five years in the making, examines the pernicious effects of gender discrimination and offers inspiring, practical stories about women who have overcome discrimination to help themselves, their families and communities. Working closely with Borges, Valenda directed CARE’s resources to help Borges produce the book Women Empowered: Inspiring Change in the Emerging World, a traveling fine art exhibit and four short documentary films.
Before joining CARE in 2001, Valenda was a photojournalist for 15 years. She was the chief photographer for the Southeast’s largest alternative newsweekly, Atlanta-based Creative Loafing, and a staff photographer for The Daily Press in Newport News, VA.
Click here to see our 2010 Activist Awards Judges
