Dan Nelken's Photograph of Ugandan Quarry Worker Janet

In 2017, photographer Dan Nelken accompanied his wife, Adele Brown, to Gulu, Uganda, where she taught critical thinking skills to blind high school students at an NGO. Nelken was asked to document the organization's activities. Fascinated by the town's main market, he sought to photograph vendors, with the help of a student named Emmanuel (Emma) who assisted in obtaining consent. One of his portraits features Janet, a quarry worker who had been carrying rocks for a decade. Janet, a mother of eight, became the family's primary breadwinner after her husband, a boda-boda taxi driver, lost a leg. Nelken's photograph captures Janet's resilience and the economic realities of her life. After returning to New York, Nelken was initially disappointed with his results, reflecting on the challenges of well-intentioned documentary projects. The photograph was featured in The Guardian's 'best photograph' series, where Nelken shared the story behind the image.