Reception on Sept. 7 to follow today's opening of the Club's annual photo exhibit, the biggest ever

The National Press Club's annual photo exhibit will open Thursday afternoon (Sept. 1) with more participants and more photos and images on display than ever before.

This year's exhibit has 215 print photos and electronic images from 59 members, with more than one-third of exhibitors taking part for the first time. Club members and guests are invited to the gala reception that officially opens the exhibit on Wednesday, Sept. 7, at 6:30 pm.

The annual show, displayed on six monitor screens and fabric panels in the Club's main 13th floor lobby, runs the entire month of September. Club members may view the exhibit at any time, as well as non-members with tickets to Club events. Otherwise, nonmembers must be escorted by NPC members.

The online exhibit catalog is now live. The catalog is best viewed on a desktop or laptop computer screen, but if using a smartphone, tilt the phone to horizontal mode to view the images.

Much of the exhibit is news photography, with images from the July 6 House committee hearings by Christy Bowe, Jamal Khashoggi protests by Phil Pasquini (see photo at left), George Floyd demonstrations in Minneapolis by Ben Sarao, and an impromptu prayer service outside the Tops Market in Buffalo, site of a white supremacist mass shooting, by Bill Bronrott. D.J. Caulfield reaches back to the 1960s for photos he captured while on the night shift for a Long Island news service, with descriptions that read like a film noir script. And ace NPC event photographer Joe Luchok catches actor and SAG-AFTRA leader Fran Drescher in a laugh with Club President Jen Judson.

The exhibit demonstrates how photography captures trends and developments beyond the headlines. New participant and Columbia University student Valerie Pires shares four images from her documentary multi-media project on LGBTQ asylum seekers in Greece, while returning participant Carol Morgan offers print photos and images from an urban agriculture initiative in D.C. Plus, Aretha Williams and Diane Stamm return with their imaginative photographic art, joined by new participant Joanne Bamberger.

With Covid-19 receding, more Club members are travelling, providing more adventure and travel photos in this year's collection. First-time exhibitor Peter West offers underwater photos from swimming with great white sharks in Mexico, and Martha Craver brings us face-to-face with polar bears in Manitoba. And returning participant Tammy Lytle provides a look at the variety of animal species in the Galapagos, while we join Kathie Scarrah on a dog sled in the snows of Montana, and new participant Claudia Flisi with hot air balloons in Myanmar.

The exhibit this year devotes a section to Photo Committee chairpersons Darlene Shields and Al Teich who died in the past 12 months. The exhibit catalog also has a page remembering Darlene and Al through their photography. 

The exhibit officially kicks off with a reception on Wednesday, Sept. 7 at 6:30 pm in the First Amendment Lounge. The reception is open to Club members and guests, with registration requested.  Members of the Shields and Teich families are expected to take part in the reception.

Questions? Contact Photo Team co-chair Alan Kotok at [email protected].