David Ryder covers coronavirus and produces documentary film

IAS alum David Ryder (鈥11) has been an independent and filmmaker for more than 15 years. His portfolio includes extensive experience with wildfires, disaster zones, and hurricane coverage. Ryder鈥檚 most recent work concerns travel restrictions to China due to coronavirus. Later this week he will photograph a U.S. government quarantine facility near North Bend where travelers from Hubei province can go if they’re not able to self-quarantine at home.

Capturing images for The New York Times, Getty Images, Bloomberg News, and Reuters, Ryder uses theoretical approaches from his M.A. in Cultural Studies (MACS) training. 鈥淢ACS allowed me time and resources to improve my cultural 鈥榩roduct,鈥欌 he says. 鈥淚 improved it by adding theory and steering my creative process with choices informed by reading and investigating and problematizing the institution in which I worked (photojournalism).鈥

Since MACS, Ryder has expanded his repertoire to documentary filmmaking. His most recent film, 鈥,鈥 follows Anthony Kelley, a UW football Rose Bowl winner, as he investigates his trauma, models his process for healing for his family, and engages with issues of toxic masculinity, identity, and race. 鈥淚 don’t think I would have been able to undertake a project like this and be successful before the doing the MACS program,鈥 says Ryder. 鈥淢ACS allowed me the time and space to develop a way of doing informed, self-aware, and ethical storytelling.鈥 to see his recent work.