Who We Are

Taylor Weidman – Co-founder/Photographer

Taylor is an American photojournalist and documentary photographer. He has worked with a number of international NGOs to cover issues in developing countries. His coverage of overcrowding in the penal system of the Philippines was recognized by the Anthropographia Award for Photography and Human Rights, and was exhibited in London, Geneva, Montreal, and New York. His coverage of homeless families in Romania won the New Talent Award at the annual Travel Photographer of the Year competition.

Taylor graduated with a Master’s in photojournalism from the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. After working at The Christian Science Monitor, Taylor left the US and completed a project about Tibetan issues as a Fulbright Fellow in Nepal. His images of Tibetans from the remote Upper Mustang region were exhibited in Kathmandu for the 50th anniversary of the Fulbright Commission.

Taylor is based in New York where he spends half his year; the other half is spent photographing abroad for VCP.

Nina Wegner – Co-founder/Writer

Nina is a writer, editor, and book designer whose work has been published internationally. Nina received a B.A. in English with an emphasis on folklore at the University of California, Berkeley. After spending four years working as an editor and marketer for California book publishers, she returned to school in 2008 at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, where she was distinguished as a Newhouse Minority Newspaper Fellow and received an M.A. in Magazine, Newspaper, and Online Journalism. Before co-founding the Vanishing Cultures Project, Nina was a journalist in New York, Florida, and Nepal. Her work has been published in The Atlantic, The Huffington Post, Public Radio International, and The Christian Science Monitor, among others.

Nina is currently a blogger for The Huffington Post, where she writes a column on indigenous issues for the Impact page. She is based in New York where she spends half her year; the other half is spent writing and collaborating abroad with Taylor Weidman for VCP.

Board Members

Peter Goodman

For nearly a decade, Peter Goodman worked as a book editor in Japan for leading companies like Tuttle Publishing and Kodansha International. In 1989, Mr. Goodman founded Stone Bridge Press in Berkeley as a publisher specializing in books about Japan and Asia. Under Mr. Goodman’s leadership, Stone Bridge Press has produced works that are now considered classics of Asian studies and has won national awards including the PEN West award for literature, the Japan-America Friendship Commission Prize from Columbia University, and the International Typographic Design Award.

Bruce Strong

As both a staff and freelance photojournalist, Bruce Strong has shot in nearly 60 countries and has been published in Time, Newsweek, US News and World Report, National Geographic, and various international magazines, as well as the Orange County Register, where he was on staff for more than a decade. Mr. Strong is now a Professional in Residence at Mediastorm and Associate Professor at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, where he teaches classes in photography and photojournalism, as well as video, audio, and multimedia storytelling. Previously, he was awarded the Knight Fellowship at Ohio University’s School of Visual Communication, and taught classes for four years in their Viscom program. Mr. Strong also served for a year as the Kellogg Public Policy Fellow in the University of Michigan’s Journalism Fellowships Program.

Dave Weidman

Dave Weidman is the CEO and Chair of Celanese, an international Fortune 500 chemical company. He is a member of the board of The Conservation Fund and serves on several advisory councils at the University of Michigan and Brigham Young University.