Cross-posted from Women Photograph
[Curated by Oriana Koren]
Editor’s Note: ASMP’s own Leah Nash has a photo featured in this article.
How do you tell the story of a year in photographs when this has been the hardest year in living memory for photographers to do their jobs? We’ve assembled this overview of 2020 through the images of one hundred members of Women Photograph, each of whom had to work through extraordinary levels of precarity — whether from the pandemic, civil unrest, heightened hostility towards working journalists, or a gruesome combination of the three.
Add to that the fact that 2020 has been hardest on women and people of color: COVID-19 has disproportionately impacted communities of color and forced unprecedented numbers of women out of the workforce in the United States, and we feel like this work is more vital than ever. Women and nonbinary photographers continue to be responsible for only about 15-20 percent of photographs in the news media, and women of color constitute a mere 3-5 percent.
And while some of this work is a dark reflection of the events of this year, we hope you’ll also find some moments of joy and hope, as life and our collective documentation of our experiences continue.