Godofredo A. Vásquez

Recipient of the STAR PHOTOJOURNALIST OF THE YEAR award in The Charles E. Green Awards (2020)

Godofredo A. Vásquez
Houston Chronicle

Judge’s Comments:

As the year of the pandemic comes to a close, there has perhaps never been a greater period of challenges presented to visual journalists.

With social distancing and restrictions to safely access the community and individuals, the fierce battle waged for lives and against COVID-19 was largely off limits to photojournalists. With communities sheltered in place, it was a challenge to document life going on while much of the public evidence of daily life had disappeared. Creative solutions were found for working outside, through windows and at a distance.

Slowly, photojournalists began to show us the enormity of heroism and suffering the pandemic had caused. 2020 Star Photojournalist of the Year Godofredo A. Vásquez of the Houston Chronicle courageously took us inside COVID wards, alongside the triumphant release of a long-haul covid patient, into funeral homes working furiously to keep up with the dead and at a graveside for socially-distanced mourning. Vásquez worked close to tear-gassed Black Lives Matter protestors and clearly positioned himself in the midst of a front line in a surreal conflict. The range and depth of his photographic coverage is impressive, down to finding an overhead view to create a whimsical curve to highlight social distancing at a public park. And the moments captured tell such stories as the photo of a young man, new to the neighborhood, dipping his toe in the floodwaters rising up to the threshold of his family’s home.

At its best, photojournalism reflects the community in all of its diversity, its triumphs and its struggles. Godofredo A. Vásquez’s portfolio of work takes the mask off the community and reveals faces that represent, validate, struggle and celebrate this most unique year.

Geri Migielicz
Stanford University

Judge’s Bio:

Geri's career includes staff photographer positions at the Emporia Gazette (KS), and the St. Joseph News-Press & Gazette (MO); graduate student at Ohio University; photo editor at the Rocky Mountain News; and then a long run as photo editor and Director of Photography at the San Jose Mercury News. She has won numerous awards for her editing as well as garnering the first national Emmy Award for video production given to members of a newspaper photo staff. Geri was a Knight Fellow and is currently the Lorry I. Lokey Visiting Professor of Professional Journalism for the Graduate Program in Journalism at Stanford University.

To see photos from Godofredo A. Vásquez’s prize-winning portfolio, please see the slideshow below: