Named among the 100 Most Important People in Photography by American Photography Magazine, Dr. Deborah Willis and is Chair and Professor of Photography and Imaging at Tisch School of the Arts, New York University, where she also has an affiliated appointment with the College of Arts and Sciences, Africana Studies. A 2005 Guggenheim and Fletcher Fellow, 2000 MacArthur Fellow, 1996 Recipient of the Anonymous Was a Woman Foundation Award and artist, she is one of the nation's leading historians of African American photography and curator of African American culture. Some of her notable projects include Reflections in Black: A History of Black Photographers - 1840 to the Present, A Small Nation of People: W.E.B. DuBois and African American Portraits of Progress, The Black Female Body in Photography, and Let Your Motto be Resistance. Her most recent works are Posing Beauty –African American Images from the 1890s to the Present, Michelle Obama, The First Lady in Photographs, and Black Venus 2010: They Called Her 'Hottentot’ (editor).  Michelle Obama, The First Lady in Photographs garnered Dr. Willis 2010 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work – Biography/Autobiography, and she is the 2010 recipient of The Society for Photographic Education's National Conference's Honoured EducatorAwards.