Howard Chapnick
This team is named after Howard Chapnick, who was a photo editor and influential leader with Black Star photo agency. After serving in the United States Air Force during World War II, Chapnick formed a new department responsible for photo essays and books at Black Star while also working to create and maintain a world-wide network of photographers. He bought the founder’s shares of Black Star in 1964 and went on to serve as the agency’s president for more than two decades. Additionally, Chapnick mentored aspiring photographers and taught annual workshops at the University of Missouri School of Journalism. In 1994, he published the book “Truth Needs No Ally: Inside Photojournalism.” Alongside Jim Hughes, Chapnick was a principal founder of the W. Eugene Smith Memorial Fund, which established a grant in his memory after he passed away in 1996.
Faculty Mentors
David Barreda
Barreda is the Deputy Photo Editor at The Los Angeles Times. He has edited for National Geographic, KQED, Earthjustice, Topic, and ChinaFile, where he launched the Abigail Cohen Fellowship in Documentary Photography in collaboration with the Magnum Foundation. He serves on the board of directors for NPPA and the core team of Diversify Photo.Before editing, he worked as a staff photojournalist at the San Jose Mercury News, the Rocky Mountain News, the Valley News, the Tallahassee Democrat, the Missourian, and the Herald of Randolph. He is a proud graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism, where he received his Master’s degree (thank you, Rita Reed). David was born in Perú, raised on a sheep farm in Vermont, and calls Oakland home.
Terra Fondriest
Terra is a freelance documentary photographer based in the Ozarks region of Arkansas - bringing the unique perspective of someone who lives and raises a family in rural America. She specializes in stories related to nature, the outdoors, hunting, farming, animals and the overall human experience of day-to-day life. With the birth of her first child, she transitioned from her former adventurous career of traveling the country as a wildland firefighter ‘hotshot’, wrangling horses for an outfitter in Montana’s Bob Marshall, and mapping the trails and features of Buffalo National River for the US Park Service, into a mostly stay-at-home mom at her hilltop house nestled in the woods of the Arkansas Ozarks. It turns out, those prior jobs were no match for the adventure of becoming a mother. This new perspective ignited her passion for visual storytelling which has grown over time into a long-term personal project called ‘Ozark Life’ where she not only documents her family, but the everyday lives of others within her small community as part of a collective patchwork of present day life in the Ozarks. ‘Ozark Life’ has been a way to share with others, the rhythm of life that is so deeply tied to the land and explore the nuances that make living in the Ozarks so unique, yet similar to the human story shared by all. Terra received her BS degree in Natural Resources from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and a post-baccalaureate degree in GIS mapping from Penn State while working for Buffalo River. Her photography education has evolved from mostly self-taught while being an active participant in the National Geographic Your Shot community, to the Missouri Photo Workshop experience in 2017, a 2018-2019 Women Photograph Mentorship, and continues presently with other mentor and workshop situations and always self-study. She became a member of the highly esteemed Women Photograph in 2018 and as of 2019, began doing freelance work with clients such as The New York Times, The Nature Conservancy, The Washington Post, Vogue, Field and Stream, National Audubon Society, The Wall Street Journal, Silver Dollar City, National Geographic, The Bitter Southerner, and more.
Photographers
Zach Agee
Russ Bray
Joshua Carter
Braelyn Furse
Becki Moss
Lukas Prinos
Grace Smith
Margo Wagner