Fiona Shields is the Head of Photography for the Guardian News and Media Group, with over twenty years’ picture editing experience across a range of newspaper titles. Fiona was picture editor of the Guardian for ten years before taking up this most recent role. Throughout her career she has been involved in the coverage of some of the most historic news stories of our time including the events surrounding 9/11 and the subsequent terror attacks in London and across Europe, conflicts around the world from Bosnia to Iraq and Afghanistan, the revolution of the Arab spring and the continuing violence in the Middle East, large scale natural disasters such as the earthquakes in Haiti, tsunamis in southern Asia, famine in Sub-Saharan Africa and the humanitarian crises resulting from the growing refugee numbers across the globe and now of course the global coronavirus pandemic.
In addition to this Fiona has had the wonderful opportunity of delivering talks at photo festivals, mentoring students of photojournalism and enjoyed judging the Sony World Photography Awards, The Taylor Wessing Portrait Prize, the Renaissance Photography Awards to name a few. This year she is joining the panel for the Carmignac Photojournalism Award and is a regular nominator for the prestigious Prix Pictet Prize.