Jorge Vera
Jorge Vera is a contemporary American photographer born in Lima, Peru.
He studied photography at Webster University,1983-1987, and mixed media at Meramec College, 1989-1992, in St. Louis, Missouri. His first solo show "Seldom Seen", opened at Mark Twain Gallery in 1989 and subsequently at Artists in the Corner Gallery in St. Louis in 1990.
Vera was awarded a studio residency and photography teaching appointment,1996-2001, at Art Center South Florida, now Oolite Arts. During this period his work is exhibited throughout the United States. Venues included the Bass Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale Art Museum, Orlando Museum of Art, Stephen Watt Gallery, Daniel Azoulay Gallery, the Florida State Capitol-Tallahassee, Indiana State University,West Tennessee Cultural Arts Center, West Virginia University, and Caelum Gallery in New York City.
Vera's work was featured in the traveling exhibit, "Contemporary Latin American Artists", funded by the Elizabeth Firestone Graham Foundation, and the Ohio Arts Council. The show traveled for 18 months to 16 museums and galleries throughout the Midwest and Southeastern United States. While in Florida he was represented by the Daniel Azoulay Gallery in Miami's Wynwood Arts District.
He returned to Peru, 2007-2014, and worked as advocate for indigenous people water rights and media content developer at Lima based NGO Clima y Cultura and as freelance photo journalist and producer for NBC News, Dateline and the Today Show, producing online media-news and documentary content for MSNBC,The Miami Herald and for ARTE TV (Association Relative à la Télévision Européenne), the EU's Franco-German public service broadcasting network.
His solo show, "urbanismo-visions of self-exile and urban life”, opened at Webster University's May Gallery, now Kooyumjian Gallery, August, 2010 and subsequently at Galeria Vertice, Jan, 2011, in Lima, Peru.
In 2011 Vera founded and taught at Lima Foto Factory, a photography school housed at the Colonial Mansion of The Marquis de la Riva (Mansion del Marques de la Riva) in Lima's historic center.
Other group shows include, "Los Seis" (The Six), August 6, 2013 at Lima Foto Factory and "30 years on the Road" at ArtCenter/South Florida's 30th anniversary alumni retrospective exhibition, November, 2014.
His ongoing 2024 series "Andean State" documents the lives of porters in the Peruvian Andes. This work focuses on the oppressed, marginalized, and largely silenced Andean men working as day labor human beasts of burden, transporting on their backs essential supplies like produce, furniture, appliances for local merchants and trekking gear and supplies for the "adventure" tourist trade across the Andean mountain range.The images are from “Porters” at La Casa del Cargador, (House of the Porters) Gregorio Condori Mamani in Cusco, Peru.
Vera has been a guest lecturer at Auburn University and Webster University. In January 2025 his work on Peru's Andean pilgrimage of Qoyllur Rit'i (Snow Star) was featured in Terrain.org and prior to that on NBC News as well as published in the memoir "Melted Away" (LSU Press, 2024), by author Barbara Drake-Vera.
