Air Force One on the Grand Rapids tarmac beyond a yellow line

Selected photography · 1980s–present

The photograph is an original seizure of history that should be admissible as evidence of fact.

Portraits of public life, first-hand witnesses, private grief, the American road, Native nations, and sacred places—joined by an insistence on presence.

Enter the collection Color & longevity

Grand Rapids, Michigan · 2007 · Photograph by David J. DeJonge

The body of work

Not a list of subjects. A record of encounters.

David’s camera has moved between formal portrait sittings and unrepeatable documentary moments. The work is most revealing when those worlds are allowed to speak to one another.

A presidential portrait and a woman on a public bench ask the same question: what becomes visible when a person is granted full attention?

All selected photographs are shown.

Panoramic black-and-white portrait of Henry Kissinger

Formal portrait of President Gerald R. Ford

Black-and-white portrait of President George W. Bush leaning against the Resolute desk in the Oval Office

Formal portrait of Justice Antonin Scalia

Newt Gingrich standing beside his desk in Washington

Portrait of X-Rite co-founder Darrell Ted Thompson posed with an X-Rite color-measurement instrument

Black-and-white portrait of the Rev. Jesse Jackson

Formal portrait of Norma McCorvey, known as Jane Roe

A mother holding her children while listening to a sermon at Roseland Christian Ministry Center in Chicago

An older woman seated beneath a Cosmetics storefront sign at Monroe Mall in downtown Grand Rapids

Susannah looking from a limousine across Arlington National Cemetery

A Pearl Harbor survivor at the National World War II Memorial

Members of the Blackfeet Nation at the United States Capitol

Portrait of Navajo Code Talker Chester Nez made in Gallup, New Mexico

Air Force One and a lone figure on the Grand Rapids tarmac

Military honor detail on the tarmac during the Gerald R. Ford funeral observances

Desert Lodge neon glowing at night on Route 66

A monk looking across the water from Mount Athos

David DeJonge meeting with Father Justin of Sinai and former Archbishop Damianos at a church in New York City

Behind the photograph · Portraiture

Ninety seconds in Grand Rapids. An invitation to Washington.

An earlier, severely limited sitting produced an image used on Gingrich’s calendar, website, and PAC brochure. A later Washington, D.C., commission brought a full large-format portrait setup into his office. The work became a defining lesson in preparation: trust may open the door, but craft has to be ready when it does.

Read the complete case record

The last witnesses

Portraiture became an act of historical rescue.

David traveled to photograph the last surviving veterans of World War I across North America, then carried the work to Britain. Nine portraits were unveiled and accepted for Pentagon display in 2008; three additional British portraits extended the record in England. The encounters became the foundation for a film, an education effort, and a public campaign.

Open the complete 12-portrait collection Follow the work into public life

Frank Buckles, David DeJonge, and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates during the Pentagon portrait unveiling — Portrait unveiling · The Pentagon · March 6, 2008 · Defense Department photograph by Cherie A. Thurlby

Susannah looking from the funeral limousine across Arlington National Cemetery — Arlington National Cemetery, March 15, 2011.

Public memory

History is carried by people before it is carried by monuments.

The photographs surrounding Frank Buckles’s final years hold both scales at once: national ceremony and personal cost. In the limousine at Arlington, the flag-draped caisson recedes while his daughter looks across the graves. It is a public event seen through a private window.

Native nations & first-hand history

Distinct lives, distinct histories.

Dennis Banks, Chester Nez, and members of the Blackfeet Nation entered David’s work through different moments and histories. The photographs are presented with the names, nations, and circumstances that give each image its meaning.

Dennis Banks · Washington Post American Indian Movement · Minnesota Historical Society Chester Nez · Library of Congress

Desert Lodge neon at night on Route 66 — Desert Lodge, from the Route 66 series, 2006.

American passage

The public road after the motorcade has gone.

Air Force One, funeral tarmacs, motel neon, roadside ruins, and the geometry of travel expand the work beyond portraiture. Here, place itself becomes the witness.

Faith & attention

Some photographs ask the viewer to become quiet.

Faith appears here not simply as a subject, but as a way of seeing. In Grand Rapids and at Orthodox monasteries in Greece, Illinois, and Washington, DeJonge photographs light, labor, sacred images, and human presence with the patience these places ask of him.

Read the faith conversation From photography to sacred-art enterprise

David J. DeJonge standing beneath a monumental chandelier and wall of icons inside New Gracanica Monastery — David J. DeJonge inside the Protection of the Most Holy Mother of God Monastery—New Gračanica · Third Lake, Illinois · June 25, 2012Photograph by Josh Stewart

A monk crossing a stone courtyard on Mount Athos — Monastery courtyard · Mount Athos, Greece · November 2024Photograph by David J. DeJonge

An Orthodox monastery courtyard at night on Vashon Island — Monastery courtyard at night · Vashon Island, Washington · October 2014Photograph by David J. DeJonge

Father Alexios and Elder Ephraim of Vatopedi Monastery examine Legacy Icons’ replica of the Christ Pantocrator from Sinai · Mount Athos, Greece · November 2024Photograph by David J. DeJonge

An upward view into the richly painted dome of St. Nicholas Cathedral in Washington, D.C. — St. Nicholas Cathedral · Orthodox Church in America · Washington, D.C. · June 22, 2022David J. DeJonge archive

The iconostasis and clergy during Holy Week at St. George Antiochian Orthodox Church in Grand Rapids — Holy Week · St. George Antiochian Orthodox Church · Grand Rapids, Michigan · April 29, 2024David J. DeJonge archive

The photograph is an original seizure of history that should be admissible as evidence of fact. “Get to the witness; get to the facts.”