Alex Webb

Alex Webb is best known for his complex and vibrant colour photographs of serendipitous or enigmatic moments. Webb ventures to places that are unlikely candidates for street photography, places that he feels contain intriguing sociopolitical tensions and clashes of culture and although he would usually be categorised as a photojournalist his work transcends the genre. 

Webb has worked in places as varied as the U.S.-Mexico border, Haiti, Istanbul, and, most recently, a number of U.S. cities. “My work is questioning and exploratory,” he says. “I believe in photographs that convey a certain level of ambiguity, that ask questions rather than provide answers.” 

Working mostly in Latin America and the Caribbean, he credits those cultures with inspiring his interest in color, when he transitioned from black-and-white photography in 1979. Webb has published 16 photography books, including The Suffering of Light, a survey of 30 years of his color photographs, and Memory City. His most recent books include La Calle: Photographs from Mexico and Brooklyn: The City Within.

He has received numerous awards and grants including a Hasselblad Foundation Grant in 1998, a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2007, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in 1990, and the Leica Medal of Excellence in 2000.