Session: Three Pulitzer Prize-Winning Photographers

By Julio Cortez
Latino Reporter Digital

When Barry Gutierrez, a prize-winning photojournalist for the Rocky Mountain News, was a boy, he told his mother he would take her places one day.

“I told her that someday I’d take her to the Entire State Building — not the Empire State Building, the Entire State Building,” Gutierrez said Friday at the National Association of Hispanic Journalists convention in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Gutierrez, 35, has lived up to that promise. A seven-year veteran of the News, Gutierrez was one of several photographers who won the Pulitzer in 2003 for coverage of wildfires in Colorado at the Denver-based newspaper. Of the 20 images in the winning package, six were by Gutierrez.

“I am living my dream,” Gutierrez said during an afternoon convention session called "Three Pulitzer Prize-Winning Photographers."

Pablo Martinez Monsivais, an Associated Press photographer based in Washington, D.C., shared his award-winning image. The crowd, however, was more interested in his most recent exploit – a secret trip Monday with President Bush to the Middle East.

“Only two people knew I was going on the trip — my boss and my fiancé, and that’s because she was in the car when I got the call,” Monsivais said.

Heis one of four photographers called by president’s press office when something important is about to happen.

Alan Diaz of The Associated Press' Miami bureau had been scheduled to attend, but was absent from the panel.