BIO
Bio
Gail Orenstein has been a photographer for 23 years. She lives in London and is a member of The NUJ and The International Press Association. She is also a news Drone journalist. Gail was the first female to drone in Kurdistan, Iraq during the Mosul offensive in Iraq 2017. She has travelled often on her own to 84 countries and started her journey documenting prisoners in Guatemala in 1982. She has photographed and droned in many conflict zones often the only female photographer in the field at the time. She was a Press photographer for The Chicago Immigration and Naturalisation office.
She worked for The Hillary Rodham Clinton Foundation and The Christian Children’s fund in Haiti documenting the AIDS outbreak. Gail covered the work of Eastern Europe European Outreach in Ukraine and Russia where she documented the lives of Russian prisoners.
In 1999 Gail moved to London and worked for Sygma and Gamma in Paris. She was also a staff photographer of Corbis, UK, covering politics in the UK.
Her recent work has focused on her drone journalism work in conflict zones. Her drone footage and photography work has been distributed world wide including CBS news, Der Stern, Aljazeera, Rudaw, The Guardian, The Chicago Tribune, The Times, Slate, Mashable, Washington Post, TIME, The BBC, The Telegraph, Kurdish TV24, Microsoft and many more.
She won the Prestigious Patagonia Travel grant and exhibits her work in Hong Kong, Greece and London.
Memberships and Associations
The International Press Association
Alumni – The School Of The Art Institute Of Chicago
FIRST AID CERTIFIED-ST. JOHNS AMBULANCE
ARPAS | Association of Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems UK
BMFA-UK | British Model Flying Association
Awards, Shows, Grants & Books:
Smuggled Into Syria-Book