Sarah Leen worked as a contributing photographer to National Geographic for 20 years before joining the staff as a senior photo editor in 2004. She became the magazine’s first female director of photography in 2013.

Sarah works with individual photographers and publishers, consulting and editing visual projects and books. Her recent work includes:

• Ukraine: A War Crime by FotoEvidence, which was short-listed for the 2023 Arles Historical Book Award and winner of the IPA Book Photographer of the Year.

• We Cry in Silence by Smita Sharma, winner of the 2023 Lucie Book Award for Independent Book.

• The Phoenician Collapse by Diego Ibarra Sanchez, winner of the 2022 Lucie Book Award for Independent Book.

• HABIBI by Antonio Faccilongo, the 2020 FotoEvidence and World Press Photo Book Award winner.

• A Troubled Home by Anush Babajanyan.

Leen is on the Board of Advisors of the Eddie Adams Workshop, on the Board of Directors of the International League of Conservation Photographers, and an inductee into the Missouri Journalism Hall of Fame.

IG: @roseleen

Jennifer Fish is a professor of women’s and gender studies at Old Dominion University, an author, and a photographer. She has documented the stories of migrant women workers around the world for 20 years, in affiliation with Human Rights Watch, the United Nations, and several policy and nongovernmental organizations. For 15 years, she taught university courses in Africa and Asia, with a focus on documentary studies of human rights, reconciliation, and social justice movements. From her extensive work with women artists in South Africa, she founded Heartworks Designs, an initiative to express global solidarity through art, adornment, and narrative textiles.

 IG: @jennifernataliefish

Nicole Limperopulos is a photographer and an associate professor of education leadership at Bank Street Graduate School of Education. Over the past 14 years she has taught graduate students who are preparing for leadership in urban schools and districts, and has directed leadership fellowships in 16 cities throughout the United States. Nicole’s research examines ways schools can develop and implement structures to support youth who are processing experiences with gun violence. Her photography explores the human desire to grasp patterns of living, not merely as an intellectual exercise, but as personal and emotional experiences.

IG: @nicolelimperopulos

Bill Marr will help with setup, tech, and operations, and throw in a lecture on editing and sequencing. He is Sarah’s longtime partner, usually along with a couple of cats.

Bill was creative director at National Geographic magazine and director of photography at The Nature Conservancy. He was named POYi Picture Editor of the Year three times for work at the Columbia Daily Tribune and the Philadelphia Inquirer magazine. He was named College Photographer of the Year in 1976.

marrcreative.com

Chef Josh Berry holds a lifelong connection to local food, seasonality, farmers, and fishermen that leads him to create a unique food style as an authentic ode to his native Maine. With 30 years of experience, he worked in Europe, throughout the United States and finally returned to Maine, where he was awarded Maine's Chef of the Year and was invited to cook at the prestigious James Beard House in NYC. His passion for food photography serves as a conduit for the expression of his dedication and belief in the collective impact of sustainable food creation and daily celebration.

IG: @chefjoshbmaine

Maggie Knowles was the editor-in-chief of edible MAINE magazine and the producer and host of Maine's first full-length cooking show, Plate the State. The couple is grateful to create intimate and lovely dining experiences with local favorites for those calling Maine their home for a night or forever.

IG: @ediblemaine

Kathy Moran is the former National Geographic deputy director of photography and the magazine’s first senior editor for natural history. Moran has produced projects about terrestrial and underwater ecosystems for the magazine since 1990. She was the project manager for the National Geographic Society/Wildlife Conservation Society’s partnership documenting photographer Nick Nichols and Dr. Michael Fay’s trek across Central Africa. The resulting stories became the impetus for the creation of Gabon’s national park system.

Moran has edited several books for the Society: Women Photographers at National Geographic, The Africa Diaries – An Illustrated Life in the Bush, Cat Shots, Tigers Forever, Secrets of the Elephants, and the upcoming Secrets of the Octopus.

She was named Picture Editor of the Year three times, twice in the POYi competition and once in the NPPA Best of Photojournalism.

Moran is a founding member of the International League of Conservation Photographers and currently serves on the Board. She is on the advisory committee for Focused on Nature and is Chair of the Jury for Wildlife Photographer of the Year. As a member of Moran Griffin Studio she continues to edit books and photo projects and mentor photographers. Moran works with the Siena International Photo Awards Festival and xPosure Festival in Sharjah, UAE. She lives in Dresden, Maine, with her husband and two bad cats.

Smita Sharma is a Delhi-based photojournalist who has documented social justice, sexual crimes, human trafficking, and environmental issues in the Global South through long-form visual narratives. Smita is a TED fellow, TED speaker, and an IWMF reporting fellow. For Stolen Lives, her in-depth work documenting sex trafficking in India and Bangladesh for National Geographic, she received the Amnesty International Media award and the Fetisov Journalism Award (Switzerland) for Outstanding Investigative Reporting.

Her work has been published in National Geographic, The Nature Conservancy, Wall Street Journal, Time, BBC World, Human Rights Watch, Die Zeit, and exhibited at the United Nations headquarters in New York. 

Smita is actively engaged in public speaking, victim advocacy, and international public education. Her book We Cry in Silence documents cross-border trafficking of underage girls in South Asia; it received the 2023 Lucie Photo Book Prize and an Award of Excellence at POYi.

Mary Virginia Swansonis an author, educator, and advisor who has spent her career helping artists find the strengths in their work, identify audiences, present their work and advance their professional path. Her background includes exhibiting, collecting, licensing and marketing photographs. She is the founder of Swanstock, a unique agency managing licensing rights for fine art photographers. Her experience includes leading the Ansel Adams Workshop and heading Special Projects at Magnum Photos. She earned the 2015 Honored Educator award from the Society for Photographic Education, and the FOCUS Award for Lifetime Achievement in Photography from the Griffin Museum. She frequently serves as a judge on contemporary photography and photo book competitions, a portfolio reviewer for industry events, and presents group learning through interactive lectures, group workshops and private mentoring. Her co-authored book with Darius Himes, Publish Your Photography Book, now in its third edition (Radius Books, 2023), is an acclaimed resource that has helped countless photographers bring their projects to publication with great satisfaction.

IG: @maryvirginiaswanson