Gus Powell was born in New York City in 1974 and attended Oberlin College where he majored in comparative religion. In 2003 he was selected to be in PDNs 30 under 30 issue and also published his first monograph, The Company of Strangers (J&L Books). His work has been exhibited internationally, including a solo show at The Museum of The City of New York and group exhibitions at The Art Institute of Chicago, Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Micamera Milano, and FOAM, NL.
His photographs have been published in Aperture, Harpers, Vogue, M – Le Monde, Wired, Fortune, The New York Times, and W. He has been a regular contributor to The New Yorker magazine for a decade. He is a member of the street photographers’ collective In-Public since 2003 and is faculty in the MFA Photography, Video and Related Media Department at the School of Visual Arts, NY.
His work is included in the books Bystander: A World History of Street Photography and Street Photography Now.
Powell’s second monograph, The Lonely Ones (J&L Books 2015), was inspired by the work of William Steig and is a return to his earlier practice of using image and text together. The book was included on best of 2015 lists at PhotoEye, Vogue, and PDN. He is represented by the Sasha Wolf Gallery in New York.
