How This Photographer Learned to See Differently

Through strong mentorship, Dhruv Rungta created a body of work focused on climate justice. 

First the light draws you in. 

In one of Dhruv Rungta’s newest photographs, a thin line of fiery orange cuts through a frame of cool shadow. Only after your eyes settle do you make out the coal furnace, the worker turning away, a faint glow from somewhere deeper inside the factory. 

“Photography is essentially about light,” says Chris Sims, associate professor of the practice and director of the Duke Center for Documentary Studies (CDS). “Dhruv manages to capture not only the amazing elemental force of that furnace — the beauty in all that gray and sooty space — but he also makes a compelling portrait of the worker. The elements of this scene pull you emotionally before you even know the environmental story behind it.”

See Rungta’s photographs during Shifts: New Expressions 2026, a public celebration of student documentary work at the Duke Center for Documentary Studies on April 23.

This May, Rungta will graduate from Duke with a self-designed Program II major in economics, ecology and sustainability development. Documentary studies is one of the many disciplines he has pursued, and photography is one of the ways he’s getting people to care about biodiversity, climate, and communities.

His photography training started in middle school through Arts High, but he says his understanding of and approach to the medium changed through mentorship at Duke. He points to two of the people who helped shape that shift: Sims and Susie Post-Rust, a longtime instructor at CDS.  

“The way that I look at stories has fundamentally changed. Before Duke, I focused on wildlife photography, and the images in my portfolio didn’t necessarily connect to each other. Here, my mentors helped me find my voice and style as an artist and also taught me how to create cohesive visual stories. In other words, I grew from a photographer to visual storyteller.”

In Small Town USA, a service-learning course taught by Post-Rust, Rungta had a semester-long assignment to document a Mexican restaurant in nearby Hillsborough.

At first, he felt awkward taking photos there — he was afraid of intruding on both the tight kitchen space and the patrons’ meals. He knew there was a distance in his pictures that he didn’t feel in person and asked Post-Rust how to photograph people without disrupting the moments he was trying to document.

“Susie came with me to the restaurant,” says Rungta. “She spent hours there guiding me on how to be present and make sure the people I photographed felt comfortable and seen. Her coming to my site to help was so above and beyond, and dramatically transformed the quality of my work.”  

Those lessons shaped Rungta’s approach as he’s documented environmental stories around the world. Last year, supported by Program II and the Chelsea Decaminada Memorial Fellowship, he traveled to rural Thailand to work with the nonprofit Bring the Elephant Home. Living alongside pineapple farmers coping with crop losses from wild elephants, he focused on the community’s innovative solutions to coexist. 

“This story had so much of what I’d studied — environmental economics, ecology, conservation, storytelling, climate change,” he says. “I got to see it intersect in the real world and play a part in bringing awareness to the challenges these communities face.” 

An exhibition of his photographs, Coexistence, was displayed in the KeohaneKenan Gallery on East Campus and will soon be opening in Grainger Hall at the Nicholas School of the Environment. 

The photographs and story were also published in Conservation Mag.  

“It’s my first time getting a story published in an international magazine,” he says. “I was really excited.” 

Alongside his photographs Rungta writes about the financial and social pressures farmers face, as well as the steps the community and government are taking, including building night watch shelters, deploying park rangers as guards, and growing alternative crops.   

The nonprofit later thanked Rungta for beautifully documenting both the challenges and the resilience of the community living alongside wild elephants. 

Since then, Sims, his Program II advisor, has helped stretch him in another way.  

“Science and photojournalism were my crutch, where I felt comfortable,” Rungta says. “Chris challenged me to think like an artist and capture highly abstract photos using color, light, and composition to evoke feelings and reflection beyond what was immediately visible. The combination of the “photojournalist” approach and the “artist” approach pushed me to the next level.”

This semester, in the Capstone Seminar in Documentary Studies taught by Sims, Rungta says that push extended to building a broader creative community with capstone students.

“We’re participating in critiques with students from broader artistic disciplines, including painters, screenwriters, and filmmakers,” Rungta says. “He pushes us to look beyond our niche and get inspired by others.” 

Another memorable mentorship moment surfaced this winter break in Mongolia. Rungta received an award to work on his capstone project, photographing communities transitioning away from coal heating during increasingly harsh winters. 

“I was photographing the story of Mongolia’s coal dependence, the human health and environmental costs, and one NGO’s, People In Need’s, efforts to address the situation,” he says. 

Partway through the trip, he hit a wall. 

“The story wasn’t as visual as my other projects. I was shooting constantly, but it felt like I was losing clarity on the narrative and wasn’t satisfied with the images I had produced so far.” he says.

He called Post-Rust. 

“She had me reflect and really distill what story I was trying to tell and what photos I needed, list it out shot by shot,” says Rungta. “I knew what gaps I was trying to fill and that helped me focus and relax in the field.”

Post‑Rust helped him reconnect with skills he already had.

“Dhruv knew how to do what he wanted to accomplish in Mongolia,” she says. “He had stronger work than he realized — I had reviewed his images, and the quality of light was beautiful. But it’s easy to feel alone when you’re on the other side of the world on assignment. He knows I’ll try to be there when he needs me. What he may not realize is that the list didn’t matter, it was simply a way to help him trust himself.”

“Mentorship at CDS and Duke is truly so special,“ says Rungta. “It’s such a gift that I can take not only incredible courses here, but that after I can call my faculty mentors for advice anytime and anywhere in the world, and they care so much and will do whatever they can to help. My work and perspective has grown in ways I couldn’t imagine thanks to them.”

Rungta will present his capstone project, a series photographs highlighting energy justice in Mongolia, as part of Shifts: New Expressions 2026 at CDS on April 23. 

The annual CDS spring celebration event is free and open to all students, faculty, staff, and community members. Come shift your perspective and see the work of a new generation of documentarians made during courses at CDS this year.

Shifts: New Expressions 2026
April 23, 5–7 p.m. 
Duke Center for Documentary Studies
1317 W. Pettigrew St. 
Durham, NC 27705
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