Photographer and filmmaker Nichole Sobecki received the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award in 2018 for her images documenting Europe’s response to the African migration crisis. In this lecture, she will discuss the COAL+ICE exhibition at the Fort Mason Center for Arts and Culture—coinciding with Governor Jerry Brown’s Global Climate Action Summit—and talk more broadly, in an interview-style format, about some of the reasons behind migration and the power and limitations of photography as an art form.

Nichole Sobecki is based in Nairobi, Kenya, and represented internationally by the photo agency VII. After graduating from Tufts University, she spent the early years of her career in Turkey, Lebanon, and Syria, focusing on regional issues related to identity, conflict, and human rights. From 2012 to 2015, she led Agence France-Presse’s East Africa video bureau and was a 2014 Rory Peck Awards News Finalist for her coverage of the Westgate mall attacks in Kenya. Sobecki’s work has been recognized by Pictures of the Year, the One World Media Awards, the Alexandra Boulat Award for Photojournalism, the Prix de la Photographie, Paris (P×3), the Magenta Foundation, and the Jacob Burns Film Center, among others. Sobecki aims to create photographs and films that demand consideration for the lives of those represented—their joys, challenges, and ultimately their humanity.