Capturing the moment: The art of a photojournalist 

Michael Baker '09
Communications Associate 

A photojournalist waits. Waits for momentum to build. Waits for events to unfold. Waits for the moment. Capturing this singular instant on film, a moment so deeply rooted in human emotion, can transcend photography and define an experience or even a life. This is the art of Jay Dickman.

“Photographers use viewfinders like a canvas,” said Dickman, a Pulitzer Prize-winner who has created art through photography for nearly 40 years. A regular contributor to National Geographic magazine, his work has also been featured in LIFE, Time and Sports Illustrated. His career has led to assignments around the world, including a war in El Salvador, the Olympic Games, national political conventions and six Super Bowls. It’s a dream vocation for a man who once leafed through LIFE magazine in awe as a child.

“I didn’t realize, at the time, the impact [photography] had on me,” said Dickman of absorbing iconic images of the Vietnam War, Apollo missions and the Civil Rights Movement in the ’60s. After graduation from the University of Texas at Arlington, this pursuit of photography led Dickman to the newsroom of the Dallas Times Herald, a doppelganger of the chaotic newsroom in Citizen Kane.

The newsroom, cluttered with half empty liquor bottles, burning cigars and reporters facedown, asleep on their desks, was Dickman’s platform to dive into the news business as a sports photographer. The possibility of realizing his goal was upon him, but still, the young photographer was filled with nerves and wavered with self-doubt.

The Dallas Times Herald was home to photographer Bob Jackson, who famously photographed Jack Ruby fatally shooting Lee Harvey Oswald. The image remains one of the most recognizable photos in American history. “I thought I was in way over my head,” said Dickman of the prospect of working beside such an acclaimed photographer. “I had plenty of excuses I could’ve used [to walk away from the job], but it helped me build a great foundation.”

Lessons learned in that smoky Dallas newsroom have aided Dickman’s development and sculpted him into an acclaimed photojournalist. Today, his photographs for renowned international publications and his superb reputation have allowed him to cover stories from boats drifting along the Amazon to submarines prepped for nuclear attack beneath Arctic ice.

“When I take the camera out of its bag, electricity still runs through me,” said Dickman, who is gracious to be given the opportunity to not only photograph exotic locations, but to interact with individuals with various religious and cultural beliefs from around the planet.

“We’re not that different when you get down to the human level,” said Dickman—whether they are famed colleagues, political opponents, teammates in sport or enemies in war. “Photography can work as a great tool for us to understand that.”

Snapping an image helps us to better understand our own experience in the world. It brings about change in thought and action that is the art of a photojournalist, and it’s why Dickman waits—waits to capture the moment.

The Grove City College Communication Studies Department hosted a discussion with Jay Dickman on Nov. 2, in Sticht Lecture Hall of the Hall of Arts and Letters on campus.