Gregory Halpern grew up in Buffalo, New York—a place that was a formative visual influence and which continues to be an inspiration to him. When he was fourteen, he had a transformative experience looking at Triptychs, a book of photographs by the local photographer Milton Rogovin, a man who had not picked up a camera until his fifties and who worked largely in obscurity until his eighties. Since then, the photobook has remained a point of fascination for Halpern, and has been the central medium of Halpern’s creative output.
Though Halpern says he is primarily motivated by the desire to “create” rather than “document”, his work is powerfully affecting. A study of working conditions for janitorial staff at Harvard, created while he was a student there, resulted in a successful bid for the minimum wage and was published as a book, Harvard Works Because We Do (2003). While his images of life in post-industrial towns of the American Rust Belt were published to critical acclaim in A (2011), and show resilience in the face of harsh social and economic realities. Halpern became a Magnum nominee member in 2018.
