Pulitzer Center Update May 15, 2026
Photoville Puts 20 Years of Pulitzer Center Photography In Focus
“Photojournalism has a unique power. It reveals a world we normally don’t see and draws our attention to the people affected most,” said Pulitzer Center CEO Lisa Gibbs. “Supporting powerful visual storytelling has been core to our work for 20 years.”
For the past 14 years, the Center has had the honor of being included in Photoville Festival, showcasing an incredible mix of photography from around the world. We’re so grateful to be included again this year, as the festival celebrates its 15-year anniversary, and we mark our 20th! We are proud to present our Photoville exhibit, digital exhibit, and photo zine, 20/20: 20 Years, 20 Photos.
In celebration of our anniversary, we selected one image for each year from the hundreds of photographers we have supported since our founding in 2006. This was no easy task. We were looking for images that reflect the diversity of regions, topics, photographers, and approaches that we have supported over the years.
We were also looking for images that capture stories that continue to have relevance today. That was the easy part. In reviewing our archive from the past 20 years, it was clear we never veered from our commitment to surface stories that illuminate underlying systemic issues. Our grantees highlighted underreported stories like the impact of civilian casualties in Afghanistan, crimes against Indigenous communities in Canada and the U.S., the rise of drone warfare, climate change, and gender and racial justice.
On January 3, 2026, just a week before we submitted our proposal to Photoville, the U.S. launched a military strike in Venezuela. We looked back to 2006, when the Pulitzer Center had supported only nine projects. One was Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez: Despot or Democrat?, a series that ran in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, where our founder, Jon Sawyer, had worked for over three decades.
“The grant made the work possible in the most literal sense: a month of sustained immersion rather than a quick pass through a story. That distinction matters enormously in documentary work,” said photographer Andrew Cutraro. “Trust takes time. Access takes time. The images that hold up over 20 years are almost never the ones made on day two.”
Other stories continue to hold weight over time: In 2009, a photo shows the severe environmental effects of desertification in China, which was at the time a little-known and underreported issue, but today is more urgent than ever. A photo of a man holding flags in South Sudan in 2011 marks the creation of the world’s youngest nation, where peace remains elusive. In Argentina, a photo essay visualizes the effects of triple-digit inflation; the economic crisis continues to define daily life there. These photos show us that our stories remain of deep importance beyond the breaking-news cycle.
We were also thinking about how the photographers' work reflected the Pulitzer Center’s story and evolution. From a bold and ambitious collaboration in 2008 around the Emmy-winning project Hope: Living and Loving with HIV in Jamaica, to projects that demonstrated collaboration with the communities they documented, creative approaches to storytelling, and innovative approaches to outreach and education, we sought to highlight photographers whose partnerships with us continued long after the stories were published.
These photos remind us of our milestones as an organization, from our beginning with a donated desk in 2006, to our first full-issue feature in The New York Times Magazine in 2016, and to the start of our Rainforest Investigations Network in 2019. They also demonstrate how the photographers we support have grown increasingly more global and diverse along with our coverage.
The hard part was, naturally, choosing just one image for each year. The selection represents a small snapshot of the dedicated, visionary, thoughtful, and inspiring photographers we have had the privilege to collaborate with over the years.
While we wished we could choose more, 20 Years, 20 Photos gave us a new way to slow down and reflect on the past 20 years, as an organization and more broadly as news makers in such a fast-paced media environment.
If you’re in New York, please join us this weekend for Photoville Opening Weekend and for our free walk and talk on Sunday at 3:00pm! Gibbs and some of the photographers featured in the exhibit will join Nathalie Applewhite, the Pulitzer Center's director of strategic partnerships, for a walk through the exhibit, discussing the featured images and what they mean to us. And if you can’t attend Opening Weekend, the photo exhibit will be on display at Brooklyn Bridge Park until May 30.
For those outside New York, don’t worry: We also have a digital version of the exhibit, featuring all the same images, plus extra behind-the-scenes content from the photographers. And stay tuned, because we have yet to announce the last photo of the collection for 2026!
We hope you celebrate the past 20 years with us, in-person or virtually, through this powerful collection of photojournalism.
All the best,
Nathalie Applewhite
Director of Strategic Partnerships
Grace Jensen
Digital Production Coordinator
This message appeared in the May 15, 2026, edition of the Pulitzer Center's weekly newsletter. Subscribe today.
