illustration by T.S Abe
Wendel A. White was awarded a BFA in photography from the School of Visual Arts in New York and an MFA in photography from the University of Texas at Austin. White taught photography at the School of Visual Arts, NY; The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, NY; the International Center for Photography, NY; Rochester Institute of Technology; and is currently Distinguished Professor of Art at Stockton University.
His work has received various awards and fellowships including an honorary Doctor of Arts (h.c.), Oakland University; Robert Gardner Fellow in Photography, Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology, Harvard University; John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship in Photography; Bunn Lectureship in Photography, Bradley University; three artist fellowships from the New Jersey State Council for the Arts; Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, and New Works Photography Fellowship from En Foco Inc. His work is represented in museum and corporate collections including:
- National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC
- Mint Museum, Charlotte, NC
- The Museum of Fine Art, Houston, TX
- Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, IL
- Archive of Documentary Arts, Rubenstein Library, Duke University, NC
- Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, Chicago, IL
- En Foco Inc., Bronx, NY
- New Jersey State Museum, Trenton, NJ
- University Museums Collection, University of Delaware, Newark, DE
- The Arts at CIIS, San Francisco, CA
- Rochester Institute of Technology, NY
- Haverford College, PA
- Paul R. Jones Collection of African American Art at University of Delaware
- NYPL Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York, NY
White has served on the boards of various non-profit and public organizations including the The Print Center (Philadelphia), Society for Photographic Education, Kodak Educational Advisory Council, New Jersey Black Culture and Heritage Foundation, the New Jersey Council for the Humanities, and the New Jersey Martin Luther King Jr. Commemorative Commission.
Recent projects include: Manifest: Thirteen Colonies (Radius Books); Red Summer; Schools for the Colored; Village of Peace: An African American Community in Israel; Small Towns, Black Lives; and others.