2011 Photographers

 NOTE:  We are still adding new material to this page. Please keep checking back for updates. Details on last year's phtographers may be found in the Archives section.

T.J. Tucker, Creative Director, Texas Monthly magazine – T.J.Tucker is the award winning creative director of Texas Monthly magazine where he oversees the design, photography, and illustration of the entire Texas Monthly brand.

Tucker has received numerous national, and international design and editorial awards from groups such as the American Society of Magazine Editors, the Society of Publication Designers, Communication Arts, the Art Directors Club, American Illustration, American Photography, 3X3, Print magazine, the City and Regional Magazine Association, the Council for the Advancement of Secondary Education, and the National Circle of Excellence in Visual Communications.

During Tucker’s stint at Texas Monthly the magazine has taken home three coveted “Cover of the Year” awards from the American Society of Magazine Editors and in 2009 Texas Monthly picked up the prestigious National magazine Award for General Excellence. That same year Ad Age named Texas Monthly’s January 2007 cover one of the “Top Ten Magazine Covers of the Decade.” In the last seven years Tucker’s work has been showcased in Time, Wired, Print, Folio, Communication Arts, 3X3, and Page. In 2010 Communication Arts called Tucker “a master of Typographic design.”

A sixth-generation Texan, Tucker was raised on his family’s ranch outside the West Texas town of Baird, where he continues to work with his father farming and ranching. He studied graphic design at Texas Tech University.

Wyman Meinzer was named the official Texas State Photographer in 1997 by then Governor George W. Bush and the 75th Legislature. Internationally acclaimed as an author and photographer, his work has graced the covers of more than 250 magazines and books. He has published over 20 photography books with subjects ranging from Texas landscapes to playas, rivers, quail, working dogs, sky, and more. Book titles include: Texas Sky (w/ John Graves), Texas Rivers (w/ John Graves), Inspiration Texas Style (w/ John Graves and Jerod Foster), Working Dogs of Texas, Between Heaven & Texas (w/Naomi Shihab Nye), Texas Hill Country (w/John Graves), Coyote, 6666: Portrait of a Texas Ranch and many, many more! Wyman is also being inducted into the "Texas Heroes Hall of Honor" this year for his contributions as a photographer and promoter of the natural history and beauty of Texas. The award is given by the Frontier Times Museum in Bandera, Texas and the Texas State Legislature will pass a resolution that honors the inductee. To see samples of his work visit his website at http://www.wymanmeinzer.com/.

Adam Jahiel. – His work has appeared in most major U.S. publications, including Time, Newsweek, The New York Times, National Geographic Society and others. Jahiel’s work also has appeared in literally dozens of books, including the acclaimed “The Day in a Life of” series. His most famous work for most westerners is The "Last Cowboy" Project. Described on his website as “For years, Jahiel has been photographing the cowboys of the Great Basin, perhaps one of the most inhospitable regions of the already rugged West. These people represent one of the last authentic American subcultures, one that is disappearing at a rapid rate. Cowboying as an art form is almost obsolete; still, the cowboys hang on, with a ferocious tenacity. Respect there doesn’t come from the trappings of modern life. Talent, knowledge and skill are valued above all else. And the cowboy tradition has its roots in the oldest of human conflicts: man against nature and man against himself.” Jahiel tries to reflect those sentiments in these photographs. These cowboys aren’t “remade” into a Hollywood image. Instead, they are “found” images, in keeping with the spirit of authenticity that permeates the best keepers of this tradition. His haunting cowboy images have also appeared worldwide in publications in France, Sweden, Bejing, Moldova, Turkey, and Kyrgyzstan. He has also worked extensively for the motion picture industry, working on projects as varied as Out of Africa, HBO comedy specials, and adventure projects like photographer for the landmark French-American 1987 Titanic expedition. www.adamjahiel.com

Jeremy Woodhouse is an outdoor, photographer based in Dallas, Texas. He spends much of each year on the road,photographing landscapes, cityscapes and wildlife. For the past five years he has been running photo toursto destinations such as Japan, Italy, Costa Rica, Mexico, and the Rio Grande Value in South Texas. He worked as a freelance graphic designer in the UK, South Africa, and the US before he began living his dream of being a full-time professional stock photographer back in 1998. Whether he’s photographing a herd of elephants at a waterhole in Botswana, or capturing the last light as it falls on the Tokyo skyline, Jeremy brings his designer’s eye to the composition and creation of all his images. He has published three books: La Luz del Pueblo: Discovering a Sense of Place in San Miguel de Allende (2008), Texas Impressions (2009), and Dallas Impressions (2011). His photos have appeared in print all over the world. He has received numerous international awards in the Wildlife Photographer of the Year Competition, and he was overall winner of the 2002 Nature’s Best International Photography Awards. His images have been included in exhibitions at the Smithsonian in Washington DC, the Dallas Museum of Natural History, and the Natural History Museum in London. He is a member of the Photographic Society of America and The North American Nature Photographers Association and he is on the Advisory Board of Nature’s Best Magazine. http://www.pixelchrome.com/blog/

Wayne Baize, CA was invited to become a member of the Cowboy Artists of America in 1995. He considers this to be the highest honor that he could obtain in his art career. From the beginning, his work has been based on photographs that he obtains while lending a hand at many famous West Texas ranches. Through the years, he says, his photographs have become more and more valuable to him. His art has won numerous awards including the silver medal award for drawings at the 1997 Cowboy Artist Show in Phoenix, Arizona. Most recently he was awarded the American Cowboy Culture Award for 2004. His paintings and drawings have graced the covers of several horse and cattle magazines including The Quarter Horse Journal, Western Horseman, and the Texas Hereford. Wayne’s work can be viewed at his studio near Fort Davis, Texas, Midland Gallery in Midland Texas; Whistle Pic Gallery in Fredericksburg, Texas; and Trailside Galleries in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and Scottsdale, Arizona. He shows annually with the Cowboy Artists of America at the Phoenix Art Museum and at the Governor’s Invitational Art Show in Cheyenne, Wyoming. http://www.waynebaizeca.com/index.html

Russell Graves is the author and photographer of The Kodak Most Basic Guide of Digital Nature Photography (2008), Communication in the Agriculture Industry (2003), Managing Wildlife as an Agricultural Enterprise (1999), The Hunting Dogs: A Photographic Tribute (2002) and The Prairie Dog: Sentinel of the Plains (2001). He is the Outdoor Photography Editor for Texas Fish & Game magazine. He grew up on a family ranch, fishing, camping, trapping, and hunting the Bois d’Arc Creek bottomlands and going to school in tiny Dodd City. After graduating college in the mid-1990’s, he married and moved to Childress. For 16 years, he taught agricultural science at a small high school where he won numerous awards for my teaching including being named Texas Agriscience Teacher of the Year in 2001, 2003, and 2006 – a feat never achieved by anyone else. http://www.russellgraves.com/index.html

Terry Nathan is a professor in the Art/Science Fusion and Atmospheric Science Programs at the University of California, Davis, where he teaches “Photography: Bridging Art and Science,” as well as courses on atmospheric fluid mechanics. Terry teaches “Lighting and Composition” at the Davis Art Center, “Principles of Composition” at the Viewpoint Photographic Art Center in Sacramento, and Landscape Photography workshops at Sorensen’s near Lake Tahoe. He was also the principle grantee and co-organizer of the 2009 UC Davis Centennial Colloquium, “The Consilience of Art and Science.” Terry has served as juror and judge for art exhibitions and has been an invited speaker at several photography symposia. Most recently, Terry was an invited speaker at the 21st Annual “Shooting the West Photography Symposium” held in Winnemucca, Nevada and was a pre-performance lecturer at the Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts, where he spoke on renowned twentieth-century photographer Mike Disfarmer. Terry’s photographic work spans landscape, architecture, documentary, and art/science fusion. His work has been shown in numerous juried exhibitions and he has published in a variety of international magazines and other print and electronic media. His recent images and articles have appeared in Sierra Heritage, Nature Photographer, Sacramento Magazine, Black and White, Weatherwise, The Remodeler’s Journal, and Architectural Stone and Landscape Design Magazine. Terry’s fine art photographic work is represented by the Appel Gallery in Sacramento, California. http://www.terrynathanphoto.com/

Rachael Waller holds a B.F.A. and Masters of Fine Art in film from world renowned California Institute of the Arts, where she studied with distinguished mentors of light & cinematography. She has shown her award winning work internationally and nationally for the past 15 years. Her prints are available in such formats and paper as giclee, cotton rag, torchon, pearl, and bamboo and artist fine canvas. She has won multiple awards including: Directors Selection for "Motion" Center for Fine Art Photography; Nominee for The Black and White Spider Awards 2011; Winner of The International Equine Photographers Spring competition; honorable mentions (2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, and 2011) for the Lucie awards; IPA winner in Wildlife; and 2010 Judge in photography for Ex Arte Equinus IV~International Equine Fine Art competition. She specializes in wild horses, Indian ponies, and longhorn cattle. http://www.Rachaelwallerphotography.smugmug.com

Laren Bridges has a diverse background in photography.Raised on a family ranch in West Texas, she grew up around cattle and horses. For two years she traveled the country meeting renowned horse breeders owners and trainers as a field editor for The American Quarter Horse Journal. In 2004, The Lyons Press contacted her and asked her to write Training and Showing the Versatility Ranch horse, published the next year, which explores AQHA’s Versatility Ranch Horse class. In 2006 she published 101 Reining Tips. She has been the cover photographer for the QHJ on several occasions and has contributed photos to Western Horseman magazine. Her photography business covers all venues of equine photography (showing, action shots, etc.), personal portraits, weddings, engagements, school photos, and senior portraits. http://www.larenbridges.com/

Crystal Allbright comes from Terlingua. She began photography with a Kodak Instamatic and kept a camera handy as she studied art and music at Austin College, a liberal arts school in Sherman, Texas. After employment as a photographer’s assistant and serving on the board of Allen Street Gallery in Dallas, she moved to West Texas in 1990 and continued her studies at Sul Ross State University, fortunate to work under Barbara Richerson. Allbright reluctantly moved from black and white film to digital color file, but has not used an SLR in years, preferring the mobility and spontaneity of smaller cameras while hiking, mountain biking and river running in the Big Bend. Her photographs have adorned the Big Bend Gazette, the Cenizo Journal, 2005-2008 Big Bend Texas Mountains Travel Guide, Mountain Bike Action, IMBA (International Mountain Bicycling Association) Newsletter, and Velo News among others. Her images have supported many area organizations including Friends of Big Bend National Park, Tierra Grande Master Naturalists, Grand Companions - Champion of Homeless Pets, South Brewster County Fire & EMS, Terlingua Recycles, and several local benefits. http://crystalallbright.wordpress.com/