News Detail

Greenfield-Sanders '70 named Commencement speaker

Timothy Greenfield-Sanders '70, an award-winning portrait photographer and documentary filmmaker, has been named 2017 Commencement speaker and recipient of the Founders' Alumni Award for Distinguished Service to the Community.
Greenfield-Sanders, who claimed a Grammy Award in 1999 and the Pratt Institute Legend Award in 2015, has served society at large by delivering intimate, incisive works in film and large-format still photography that have often captured the misunderstood or marginalized.

"We are honored to present this award to an alumnus who has made the world better by looking through the lens of his camera, using his transcendent works to shed insight into our shared humanity," Head of School Penny Townsend said. "We are so proud to call Timothy Greenfield-Sanders a member of the Ransom Everglades community."

Each year the award is given to an alum who has helped to fulfill the vision of the founders of the Ransom and Everglades Schools. It is awarded to individuals who have been deeply concerned about their communities and have demonstrated honor, courage and leadership. Through their loyal attitude, inspired spirit and unselfish action, they have fulfilled the mission of the Ransom Everglades School.

Commencement takes place May 19 at the Lewis Family Auditorium.

Greenfield-Sanders’ most recent project, "Identity: The List Portraits," was displayed at the Annenberg Space for Photography in Los Angeles from September through Sunday, Feb. 26. It included 151 of his groundbreaking "List" portraits, which were conceived to illuminate breakthroughs in various communities: The Black List, The Latino List, The Women’s List, The Out List and The Trans List.

His portraits have been included in the collections of The Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum, The Whitney Museum and The National Portrait Gallery, and nearly a dozen books on his works have been published.

Greenfield-Sanders also has produced and directed 12 films, including the Grammy Award-winning "Lou Reed: Rock and Roll Heart," a documentary about the legendary musician that was honored as best music documentary of 1998. He credits legendary RE teacher Dan Leslie Bowden with igniting his passion in theatre and the humanities. The works of Andy Warhol also inspired him, and Greenfield-Sanders has frequently recounted the unexpected tutelage he received as an aspiring young photographer in Los Angeles from actress Bette Davis, who didn't like his approach to a photo shoot and took him under her wing for a week to explain how experts captured her portrait.

Greenfield-Sanders earned his undergraduate degree in art history from Columbia University and master's in film from the American Film Institute in Los Angeles. His mother, Ruth Greenfield, founded the Fine Arts Conservatory in the 1950s and has been credited with helping bring integration to the arts in Miami. Siblings Charles Greenfield ’68, Frank Greenfield ’71 and Alice Greenfield ’76 also attended RE.
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Founded in 1903, Ransom Everglades School is a coeducational, college preparatory day school for grades 6 - 12 located on two campuses in Coconut Grove, Florida. Ransom Everglades School produces graduates who "believe that they are in the world not so much for what they can get out of it as for what they can put into it." The school provides rigorous college preparation that promotes the student's sense of identity, community, personal integrity and values for a productive and satisfying life, and prepares the student to lead and to contribute to society.