Entry Title: " Obamaland:Triumph and Downfall"
Name: Amanda Rivkin, United States


Story: By election night, I had met Obama once personally in 2004 when I was an intern in the opposition research section of his campaign for the U.S. Senate. He had already delivered his historic speech at the Democratic Convention in 2004 that marked his first step to the national stage; even Fox News had the audacity to call him “America’s first black president.” The second time I had seen him was to photograph him on Halloween at a campaign rally in Highland, Indiana. By election night, I had been privy to advance meetings with his campaign staff discussing the high levels of choreography and security involved. The only thing they didn’t mention was the bullet proof glass, so the day before election night they ran a lighting test, I took several shots of the glass and other features of the stage. When election night came and Obama won, I was perhaps better ready than I had ever been for any photograph. The image of Blagojevich is the complete opposite. The exclusive access came very last minute. Unlike Obama, Blagojevich was not polished and had a sharp tongue; emotionally he was all over the place. Unable to ingratiate himself to anyone but the local media and Chicago’s under classes, his precipitous downfall represented Chicago politics at its worst and most backbiting. The previous governor of Illinois is currently serving a six-year prison term in Wisconsin, but Blagojevich became the first governor in Illinois history to be impeached from office.

Amanda Rivkin, 24, is a photojournalist currently based in her hometown, Chicago. She has photographed for Agence France Presse/Getty Images, Der Spiegel, The New York Times, Newsweek, among others. Her work has appeared on the front pages of Le Monde, The New York Times, and The Washington Post and in such international publications as The Financial Times, Foreign Policy, and The London Sunday Times Magazine. Since early 2008, Amanda has been based in Chicago. She has covered Illinois and national politics including Barack Obama's election night victory, transition to the presidency, and historic inauguration, the corruption scandal surrounding Rod Blagojevich and his final day in the Illinois governor's office where she was the sole photographer to shadow him for The New York Times. Amanda produced several features surrounding the financial crisis and its impact on the midwestern United States as well as spot news, features, and personal projects on a range of topics including public housing, education, and immigration. Additionally she has received support and funding to pursue stories and other reporting opportunities in Ethiopia, Germany, Hungary, Mexico, Poland, Spain and the United States. She speaks fluent Spanish, Portuguese and Polish. Amanda previously worked as a writer and researcher for news media, policy, diplomatic, and cultural organizations and is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism in New York. Amanda will relocate to Washington, D.C. in August 2009 to complete a one year master's degree in terrorism and sub-state violence in the security studies program at the Georgetown University Edmund Walsh Graduate School of Foreign Service.