Jess T. Dugan

Jess T. Dugan (American, b. 1986 Biloxi, MS) is an artist whose work explores issues of identity
through photographic portraiture. They received their MFA in Photography from Columbia College
Chicago, their Master of Liberal Arts in Museum Studies from Harvard University, and their BFA in
Photography from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design.
Dugan’s work has been widely exhibited and is in the permanent collections of over 40 museums,
including the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, the International Center of Photography, the
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the Minneapolis Institute of Art, the
St. Louis Art Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Photography, and the Library of Congress.
Dugan’s monographs include Look at me like you love me (MACK, 2022), To Survive on This Shore:
Photographs and Interviews with Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Older Adults (Kehrer
Verlag, 2018) and Every Breath We Drew (Daylight Books, 2015).
They are the recipient of a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, an ICP Infinity Award, and were selected
by the Obama White House as an LGBT Artist Champion of Change.
Dugan’s editorial clients include the ACLU Magazine, The Guardian, The New York Times, The New
York Times Magazine, and TIME.
Dugan teaches workshops at venues including the Anderson Ranch Arts Center in Snowmass Village,
CO, the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA, and Filter Photo in Chicago, IL. In 2015, they cofounded the Strange Fire Collective to highlight work made by women, BIPOC, and LGBTQ artists. For
the 2020-2021 academic year, Dugan was the Henry L. and Natalie E. Freund Teaching Fellow at
Washington University in St. Louis.