Meiselas, Susan

American, b. 1948

BiographyDirectly political and fiercely concerned with a revolution counter to American foreign policies of the day, Susan Meiselas's documentation of the atrocities and tragedies of daily life in the midst of political turbulence belong to a fervent branch of concerned photojournalism. Meiselas spent a year documenting the 1978-79 Sandanistan revolution in Nicaragua from a point of view decidedly sympathetic to the rebel forces. The woman portrayed fleeing with a naked baby in tow in Fleeing the Bomb to Seek Refuge Outside of Esteli is tragic, but not nearly as visceral as much of Meiselas's documentation of violence and torture from the same series. Meiselas operates under the photojournalistic principle of photographer as public conscience and of the photograph as evidence of realities that most people would rather ignore.

Born in 1948 in Baltimore, Susan Meiselas grew up on Long Island. She received a BA from Sarah Lawrence College, Bronxville, New York (1970) and an EdM from Harvard University School of Education (1971). A member of Magnum Photos, Meiselas has received many grants and awards, including the Hasselblad Foundation Prize, the Robert Capa Gold Medal for Outstanding Reportage, and fellowships from The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and The National Endowment for the Arts. Her photographs have been exhibited at the Art Institute of Chicago; Camerawork, London; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; the International Museum of Photography, George Eastman House, Rochester, New York; and the Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego, among others.