Chris Rainier

Chris Rainier

Chris Rainier

National Geographic Society Fellow; Documentary Photographer; Founder and Director of The Cultural Sanctuaries Foundation; Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society

Chris Rainier is a National Geographic Society Fellow and documentary photographer who is highly respected for his documentation of endangered cultures and traditional languages. He is the founder and director of The Cultural Sanctuaries Foundation, whose Mission is to help preserve endangered biodiversity and traditional cultures. In 2002 he was awarded the Lowell Thomas Award by the Explorers Club and he is a Fellow of the Royal Geographic Society. In the early 1980s, Chris was Ansel Adams’ last photographic assistant. They worked together to amplify the use of art photography as a social tool, and to preserve threatened wilderness areas and US National Parks. Rainier then went on to collaborate with UNESCO and IUCN on a global project using photography to preserve endangered wilderness. Since then, Chris has led numerous documentation projects of indigenous groups with extensive expeditions in Australia, Africa, Asia and South America, and has completed photographic projects for the United Nations, UNESCO, Amnesty International, Conservation International, the Smithsonian Institution, TIME Magazine, the New York Times, LIFE Magazine and the National Geographic Society. He has photographed global culture, conflict, famine, and war in Somalia, Sarajevo/Bosnia, Sudan, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Cambodia, and Iraq for TIME Magazine and for NPR Radio.

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