Jim Hubbard is an acclaimed documentary photographer who, in 2007, was the first photographer to be the recipient of the prestigious Lewis Hine Distinguished Service Award given by the National Child Labor Committee. He also won the Leica Award for Excellence in 1988 for series on Homeless in America. A Fellow at the USC Annenberg School for Communications and a co-founder of the USC Institute for Photographic Empowerment, Jim has been nominated three times for the Pulitzer Prize for his homelessness series 1987, Rapid City 1972, SD flash flood and Wounded Knee coverage 1973, and has won over 100 awards from the National Press Photographers Association(NPPA), White House News Photographers Association(WHNPA) and United Press International (UPI). His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, featured in print and television media, and published in his book American Refugees, Forward by Jonathan Kozol, University of Minnesota Press (1991).
Hubbard began his career as a photojournalist in Detroit during the tumultuous 1960?s with the 1967 Detroit riots one of the first major international stories he covered. Jim’s photographs have been published in most of the world’s major print publications and he has covered many of the world’s major stories including the 1972 Munich Olympics and massacre, the 1979 Cambodian genocide by the Pol Pot regime, the death of 10,000 people during a cyclone near Calcutta, India, and the Wounded Knee siege in 1973. Jim also served with the White House Press Corps during his 16 year staff position with United Press International (UPI) and has photographed five U.S. presidents and numerous presidential campaigns including traveling with Bobby Kennedy shortly before his death in 1968.
After 25 years as a professional photojournalist, Hubbard founded Shooting Back in Washington, D.C. to empower disenfranchised youth with the ability to describe their world: with the camera they “shot back” as the experts of their lives rather than the subjects of a professional’s work. The pioneering nature of Jim’s methodology has been cited in a wide range of literature and academic journals on photography, visual sociology and contemporary art. Hubbard also authored four books including Shooting Back, Forward by Dr. Robert Coles, Chronicle Books (1991) and Shooting Back from the Reservation, Forward Dennis Banks, The New Press (1994). Shooting Back’s photographs have been among the most widely viewed and publicized images in modern photographic history.
Hubbard holds both Master of Arts and Master of Divinity degrees.