“My life is shaped by the urgent need to wander and observe, and my camera is my passport.”
— Steve McCurry

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A child of the Vietnam Era, J.P. Spicer-Escalante longed to be a conflict photographer as he watched the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite as a young boy. As a teenager, J.P. began to discover the world. Living in South America permeated his worldview, permanently changing him. He has since photographed in almost 50 countries around the world. When not on a plane with his cameras, he is a Professor of Hispanic Studies at Utah State University.

 

His photography is the product of his contact with the world around him. “My journeys have left an indelible mark on my soul, on who I am. People are at the core of life, as they are in my photographic work. They provide me the certainty that, in spite of all, people continue to live life, day by day, in a vast number of locales around the world. I constantly evoke my interaction with the world around me, especially the people who populate those spaces. I want my images to tell the stories of their lives, the world in which they live, and the objects with which they interact."

 

Spicer-Escalante’s work has been exhibited in Salt Lake City (Utah), Logan (Utah), and at both the LatinX Cultural Center and the Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art on the Utah State University campus. It has also been published in specialized photography venues. He recently completed a certificate degree in Digital Photography through Cornell University (U.S.A.).