Michel du Cille, BA'85, is a Pulitzer Prize winning photographer whose work documenting the lives of people facing extraordinary challenges and inconceivable tragedy has drawn public attention to neglected social issues. After graduating, du Cille went on to work as a photojournalist for the Miami Herald and the Post. He won his first Pulitzer at the Herald, sharing the spot news photography prize for coverage of the 1985 eruption of a Colombian volcano. His second Pulitzer, also for the Herald, was for his photo essay of crack cocaine addicts in a Miami housing project.
In 1988, du Cille joined The Washington Post as picture editor, and he eventually became head of the Post's photojournalism staff. The paper won the Pulitzer Prize for public service in 2008 for coverage of the treatment of wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Du Cille worked on the series with reporters Dana Priest and Anne Hull. Their stories led to changes in the government's care of injured veterans. Du Cille died in December, 2014 while on assignment in Liberia for The Washington Post.
Before his death, du Cille was in regular contact with IU faculty and staff. He had planned to return to Bloomington as a guest speaker in IU journalism professor of practice Tom French's Behind the Prize class. He was a member of the former IU School of Journalism's first class of Distinguished Alumni in 2011.
