info: bio
Amanda Rivkin, 25, is a photojournalist and writer currently based in Washington D.C. Her work has been featured on the front pages of Le Monde, The New York Times, and The Washington Post and in international publications Foreign Policy, The London Sunday Times Magazine, Newsweek, and others.
In 2007, Amanda began her journalism career as an intern with The Associated Press in Madrid, before photographing for The Associated Press and BBC Focus on Africa Magazine in Ethiopia during the Coptic Millennium. In 2008 Amanda relocated to her hometown, Chicago. There she photographed for publications including The New York Times, where she was a regular contributor for one year, in addition to work for Agence France Presse, Courrier Japon, The Financial Times, Le Monde, Newsweek and others.
From Chicago, Amanda covered Barack Obama’s election night victory, transition to the presidency and historic inauguration in Washington, D.C., the corruption scandal surrounding Rod Blagojevich and his final day in the Illinois governor’s office when she was the sole photographer to shadow him for The New York Times - work that was recognized by The Year in Pictures in both The New York Times and Newsweek in late 2009. Additionally, her work focused on the financial crisis and its impact on people and industry of the Midwestern United States, public housing, education and immigration.
Amanda has also covered stories with an international focus, photographing a Mexican faith healer with the assistance of a scholarship from the Foundry Photojournalism Workshop; everyday life under errant Qassam rockets fired from Gaza six months before tensions escalated into a fullblown conflict; a magazine-length article on German-Polish tensions simmering over post-World War II refugee issues in the modern era with the assistance of a fellowship from the American Council on Germany; and an interview with a former KGB General and a piece on Google's role in China for Foreign Policy, among other stories. Recently, she was awarded a Young Explorers Grant from the National Geographic Society for a project she will undertake in the Caucuses and eastern Turkey. Amanda's photographic work has been exhibited in Chicago, Washington D.C. and Aleppo, Syria.
Currently Amanda is based in Washington D.C. while attending the security studies master’s degree program at the Georgetown University Edmund Walsh Graduate School of Foreign Service after receiving a significant merit-based scholarship in 2009. Amanda speaks fluent English, Spanish, Portuguese and Polish and is also a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism in New York.