Documentary Storytelling

with Matt Black

July 21 – 25, 2025

Tuition $2495.00

(includes meal plan, see below)

Location Fee $65.00

Standard Deposit $400.00

Course Description

Join photographer Matt Black for an intensive week-long workshop designed to help you to develop and sharpen your photographic storytelling skills. Designed both for those looking to deepen an existing project or to start something new, Matt challenges you to think about your work critically and consider your vision, your voice, and the role of your work in the world.

This workshop features discussions and exchanges designed to challenge you to reflect thoughtfully about your photography and how it can engage audiences and advance a purpose. The intersection of personal and public, the documentary vs. the interpretive, and the historical vs the contemporary are all topics for our group discussions as we strive to bring our work from a private vision to a larger, public role.

We begin on Monday morning as Matt presents his early work as a photographer through his present-day projects, discussing his methods and approach. Brief assignments, group discussions, brainstorming sessions, and image reviews are interspersed throughout the week. We work towards sharpening the language of your photography so that it more closely aligns with your ideas and goals, highlighting your ability to interpret and visualize the world in a personal way. Towards the end of the workshop week, we focus on mapping out potential trajectories for each participant moving forward.

We also examine the wide cultural diversity of Santa Fe and practice documenting people and place. Through daily, individual assignments, you are challenged to create imagery and practice your storytelling techniques. Back in the classroom, we use your newly generated work to discuss editing, sequencing, and strategies for creating a cohesive narrative.

This workshop is designed for photographers seeking to clarify vision and purpose within their documentary work. Join Matt for a week in Santa Fe to move forward with focus and direction in your storytelling.

Additional Information

WHO SHOULD ATTEND:

Advanced Amateurs, Professionals

What You Should Know:

Working knowledge of digital workflow and manual mode on your digital SLR or mirrorless camera. Participants must be able to download and select images using image editing software for class sessions.

Activity Level:

To get the most from your workshop experience, participants should be in good physical (mobility, stamina) and mental health. Come prepared for the high elevation of Santa Fe, long days, and seasonal weather including high temperatures. You must be able to carry your own photographic and personal gear at all times, both on campus and on location. You are responsible for being open and honest about your physical fitness, and we reserve the right to remove you from the workshop if we find your fitness to be less than that which you have described.

Participants should be able to engage in moderate outdoor exercise for up to an hour or more at a time. Location work is likely to include early morning and/or late evening shoots. Daily assignments will be self-directed, as participants travel around Santa Fe to document the world around them. Participants should therefore prepare for several hours of photographing around the city on their own.

Policies:

View Payment, Refund, Withdrawal, and Transfer Policies for domestic workshops.

Accommodations:

Participants are responsible for making their own housing arrangements in Santa Fe. On-campus accommodations are not currently available.

Meals:

Lunch Monday through Friday, dinner before the Friday evening Image Presentations, and daily beverage service are included.

about

Matt Black

Matt Black is from California’s Central Valley, a rural, agricultural area in the heart of the state. Between 2014 and 2020, he traveled over 100,000 miles across 46 states for his project American Geography, published by Thames and Hudson in 2021 accompanied by a traveling exhibition that opened at the Deichtorhallen, Hamburg. Other works include The Dry Land, about the impact of drought on California’s agricultural communities, and The Monster in the Mountains, about the disappearance of 43 students in the southern Mexican state of Guerrero. Both these projects, accompanied by short films, were published by The New Yorker.

Matt’s work has appeared regularly in the US and international press, including TIME Magazine, The New Yorker, Le Monde and Internazionale. He has been honored three times by the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Prize, received the W. Eugene Smith Memorial Award, and was named a fellow at the Emerson Collective and the National Geographic Society.

Other honors include the National Press Photographers Association, the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, the California Arts Council, and World Press Photo. He was nominated to join Magnum Photos in 2015 and became a full member in 2019.

Website: mattblack.com