Kevin Bubriski (born 1954) is an American

documentary photographer Documentary photography usually refers to a popular form of photography used to chronicle events or environments both significant and relevant to history and historical events as well as everyday life. It is typically undertaken as professional ph ...

Life and career

Bubriski was born in North Adams, Massachusetts. He attended

Bowdoin College Bowdoin College ( ) is a Private college, private liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Brunswick, Maine. It was chartered in 1794. The main Bowdoin campus is located near Casco Bay and the Androscoggin River. In a ...

Brunswick, Maine Brunswick is a New England town, town in Cumberland County, Maine, United States. Brunswick is included in the Lewiston-Auburn, Maine metropolitan New England city and town area. The population was 21,756 at the 2020 United States Census. Part o ...

, graduating in 1975. He worked as a photographer for nine years in Nepal and has also photographed trips to

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ), or Greater Tibet, is a region in the western part of East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are other ethnic groups s ...

Syria Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to Syria–Turkey border, the north, Iraq to Iraq–Syria border, t ...

Bangladesh Bangladesh, officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, eighth-most populous country in the world and among the List of countries and dependencies by ...

, and within the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. Bubriski lives in

Vermont Vermont () is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, New York (state), New York to the west, and the Provinces and territories of Ca ...

with his wife. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the

National Endowment for the Arts The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created in 1965 as an independent agency of the feder ...

, and the

Asian Cultural Council The Asian Cultural Council (ACC) is a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing international cultural exchange between Asia and the U.S. and between the countries of Asia through the arts. Founded by John D. Rockefeller III in 1963, A ...

. Kevin Bubriski has exhibited worldwide; his work can be found in the permanent collections of the

Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street (Manhattan), 53rd Street between Fifth Avenue, Fifth and Sixth Avenues. MoMA's collection spans the late 19th century to the present, a ...

, The

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an Encyclopedic museum, encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the List of largest museums, third-largest museum in the world and the List of larg ...

, and the

International Center of Photography The International Center of Photography (ICP) is a photography museum and school at 84 Ludlow Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan in New York City. ICP's photographic collection, reading room, and archives are at Mana Contemporary in Jer ...

, all in New York, as well as the

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is a modern art, modern and contemporary art museum and nonprofit organization located in San Francisco, California. SFMOMA was the first museum on the West Coast devoted solely to 20th-century art ...

, the

Yale University Art Gallery The Yale University Art Gallery (YUAG) is an art museum in New Haven, Connecticut. It houses a major encyclopedic collection of art in several interconnected buildings on the campus of Yale University. Although it embraces all cultures and period ...

, the

Center for Creative Photography The Center for Creative Photography (CCP), established in 1975 and located on the University of Arizona's Tucson campus, is a research facility and archival repository containing the full archives of over sixty of the most famous American ph ...

in Tucson and the

Bibliothèque Nationale de France The (; BnF) is the national library of France, located in Paris on two main sites, ''Richelieu'' and ''François-Mitterrand''. It is the national repository of all that is published in France. Some of its extensive collections, including bo ...

in Paris. Kevin Bubriski's book, ''Portrait of Nepal,'' won the Golden Light Documentary Award in 1993 and his work has been featured in several publications, including the

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

and the

LA Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper in the U.S. and the large ...

. In 2002, his work was included in a group exhibition about September 11 at the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...

. Bubriski was a recipient of the 2004

Hasselblad Masters Award Hasselblad Masters Award is an bi-annual award granted by the camera company Hasselblad to selected photographers each year across various specialties in recognition of exceptional accomplishment through photography. While its sister prize, the Has ...

. Bubriski was awarded the 2010-2011 Robert Gardner Visiting Artist Fellowship in Photography. An exhibit of Bubriski's work, entitle
Shadows of Shangri La: Nepal in Photographs
" was on display in Cambridge, Massachusetts from May to September 2014. The show was sponsored by

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology The Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology is a museum affiliated with Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1866, the Peabody Museum is one of the oldest and largest museums focusing on anthropologica ...

and the university's Asia Studies Center. Together the exhibit and its accompanying publication, ''Nepal: 1975–2011,'' "document the dramatic evolution of daily life in Nepal, from its years as a Hindu kingdom to what ubriskicalls 'the current precarious peace'." Over 2016-17, Bubriski was on a Senior Scholar Fulbright Fellowship in Nepal, where he conducted fine art photography in some of the remotest regions of Nepal and Tibet (China).

Reception

Bubriski's exhibition "Shadows of Shangri La: Nepal in Photographs" and his book ''Nepal: 1975–2011'' have been featured in the

Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe,'' also known locally as ''the Globe'', is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes. ''The Boston Globe'' is the oldest and largest daily new ...

Nepali Times ''Nepali Times'' (stylized as NEPALI Times) is an English weekly newspaper that provides reporting and commentary on Nepali politics, business, culture, travel and society in 16 pages. The weekly is aimed at the expatriate, diplomatic and busine ...

, ECS Nepal,

Kathmandu Post ''The Kathmandu Post'' is a major daily newspaper published in Nepal. Founded in February 1993 by Shyam Goenka, it is one of the largest English-language newspapers in the country. The newspaper is published by Kantipur Publications, the publi ...

, ''

Asian Ethnology ''Asian Ethnology'' is an open access, peer-reviewed journal dedicated to the promotion of research on the peoples and cultures of Asia. It was first published in 1942 at the Catholic University of Peking as ''Folklore Studies'' and subsequently ...

'', Art New England, and

Harvard Magazine ''Harvard Magazine'' is an independently edited magazine and separately incorporated affiliate of Harvard University. It is the only publication covering the entire university and regularly distributed to all graduates, faculty, and staff. The ...

. In his review for ''Asian Ethnology'' Niels Gutschow of

Heidelberg University Heidelberg University, officially the Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg (; ), is a public research university in Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Founded in 1386 on instruction of Pope Urban VI, Heidelberg is Germany's oldest unive ...

was able to "value Bubriski's work as a unique testimony that destroys any reproaches" for "Bubriski does not present clichés and he does not indulge the colonial gaze that tends to isolate the exotic." Bret Chenkin of Art New England critiques that "the earliest works appear stronger—have more visual dynamism and authenticity." Yet Chenkin appreciates the accessibility of the later images, explaining that "they bring a viewer sitting half the world away that much closer. Anyone who reads Bubriski's photographic journal will be satiated visually, artistically and culturally."

Mark Feeney Mark Feeney (born July 28, 1957) is an author and arts writer for ''The Boston Globe'' for over four decades. He is the author of two books, ''Nixon at the Movies'' (2004) and ''Nixon and the Silver Screen'' (2012). Feeney is a native of Cambridg ...

of the Boston Globe writes: "Bubriski's images convey a sense of Nepal that feels strong, full, and nuanced. His book, ''Legacy in Stone: Syria Before War'' was featured in

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'', locally known as ''The'' ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'' or ''WP'', is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington m ...

The New York Review of Books ''The New York Review of Books'' (or ''NYREV'' or ''NYRB'') is a semi-monthly magazine with articles on literature, culture, economics, science and current affairs. Published in New York City, it is inspired by the idea that the discussion of ...

, Roads and Kingdoms, and on public radio stations WBUR and

VPR Vpr is a Human immunodeficiency virus gene and protein product. Vpr stands for "Viral Protein R". Vpr, a 96 amino acid 14-kDa protein, plays an important role in regulating nuclear import of the HIV-1 pre-integration complex, and is required for ...

. ''Our Voices, Our Streets: American Protests 2001-2011'' was featured in

, and in

the Daily Beast ''The Daily Beast'' is an American news website focused on politics, media, and pop culture. Founded in 2008, the website is owned by IAC Inc. It has been characterized as a "high-end tabloid" by Noah Shachtman, the site's editor-in-chief ...

. ''The New Mexicans: 1981-83'' was featured in '' Pasatiempo.''

Published works

*''Portrait of Nepal'' (Chronicle Books, 1993) *''Power Places of Kathmandu'' (Inner Traditions, 1995) *''Pilgrimage: Looking at Ground Zero'' (Powerhouse Books, 2002) *''Michael Rockefeller: New Guinea Photographs, 1961'' (Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, 2007) *''Maobadi'' (Himal Books, 2011) *''Nepal: 1975–2011'' (Radius Books & Peabody Museum, 2013) *''Look into My Eyes: Nuevomexicanos por Vida, '81-'83'' (Museum of New Mexico Press, 2016) *''Kailash Yatra: a Long Walk to Mount Kailash through Humla,'' co-author Abhimanyu Pandey (Penguin, 2018) *''Mustang in Black and White'', co-autho
Sienna Craig
(Vajra Books, 2018) *''Legacy in Stone: Syria Before War'' (Powerhouse Books, 2019) *''Our Voices, Our Streets: American Protests 2001-2011'', Forward: Lucy McKeon, Afterward:

Howard Zinn Howard Zinn (August 24, 1922January 27, 2010) was an American historian and a veteran of World War II. He was chair of the history and social sciences department at Spelman College, and a political science professor at Boston University. Zinn ...

(Powerhouse Books, 2020) *''Nepal Earthquake''. Foreword:

Manjushree Thapa Manjushree Thapa (born 1968 in Kathmandu) is a Nepalese–born Canadian essayist, fiction writer, translator and editor. She is one of the first English writers of Nepali descent to be published internationally. '' Forget Kathmandu'' and '' The T ...

(Himal Books, 2022) *''The Uyghurs: Kashgar before the Catastrophe''. Text by

Tahir Hamut Izgil Tahir Hamut Izgil (born 1969) is a modernist Uyghur poet, filmmaker, and activist. A leader in avant-garde Uyghur poetry in the 1990s, he is known for poems and films strongly influenced by Uyghur life. Originally from Xinjiang, he is currently ...

and essay by Dru C. Gladney (George F. Thompson, 2023) *''The New Mexicans: 1981-83''. Contribution by J. Matthew Martinez. Foreword by

Bernard Plossu Bernard Plossu (born 1945) is a Vietnam-born French photographer. His work is held in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts and the Center for Creative Photography, both in Tucson, Arizona. Life and work Plossu was born in Da Lat, Vietnam a ...

. (Museum of New Mexico Press, Santa Fe, New Mexico, 2024)

References

External links

*http://www.kevinbubriski.com/ {{DEFAULTSORT:Bubriski, Kevin 1954 births Asian Cultural Council grantees Bowdoin College alumni Living people American documentary photographers Photographers from Massachusetts People from North Adams, Massachusetts 20th-century American photographers 21st-century American photographers Himalayan studies