John Gevers

Early Life & Education

John Gevers grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana, where his twin passions for writing and photography took root early. By the time he reached his junior year at South Side High School, he had worked his way up to editor of the school newspaper—a fitting preview of the career ahead. He went on to Indiana University’s Ernie Pyle School of Journalism, where he double-majored in journalism and psychology, a combination that would come to define his distinctly humanistic-laced-with-spirituality approach to storytelling.

At IU, John studied photojournalism under the preeminent photographer John Ahlhauser and learned story-enhancing editing from The Saturday Review’s Richard Tobin. He graduated in 1989 with the rare ability to marry rigorous journalistic instinct with genuine aesthetic vision.

Rotary Scholar & Ambassador

As a university junior at just 21 years old, John was selected as the youngest American to serve as an Ambassador to New Zealand through Rotary International and the U.S. government. Stationed at the University of Otago in Dunedin, he studied and travelled the country speaking to audiences and media large and small. His mission was a diplomatically significant one under the Reagan administration: to help counter anti-American sentiment stirred by the 1986 suspension of the ANZUS Alliance over nuclear policy.

Beyond the lecture halls, John immersed himself in New Zealand’s agrarian life, working on family farms raising sheep, goats, dairy cattle, and deer. This experience planted the seeds for his long-running journalistic and artistic project chronicling sustainable family farming across the Heartlands of New Zealand and the United States. It was also during this year abroad that his formal photography training crystallized into a lifelong artistic calling: capturing the decisive moment with empathy and beauty.

Career in Marketing, Multimedia & Communications

John’s professional career has spanned not-for-profit and corporate environments from Oregon to Indiana. At Big Brothers/Big Sisters of Fort Wayne, he managed youth casework and public relations. He went on to direct youth programs at religious and secular institutions in Fort Wayne and Portland, and served in development at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Metropolitan Portland.

As Community Affairs Director at the Allen County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, John created innovative proactive community programs—including a Community Prosecution initiative that empowered citizens in the aftermath of crime—earning a reputation as a creative problem solver who fills gaps before organizations realize they exist. Following a 1996 Creative Conflict Resolution course at Syracuse University in Washington, D.C., he sharpened skills that have served him throughout his career in advocacy,  communications, and the arts.

At Parkview Health System, John rose to Lead Marketing Specialist, managing  department staff and crafting marketing and public relations strategies for medical service lines including orthopedics, neurology, trauma, and emergency flight. At Lincoln National Corporation in 2000, he saved the company an estimated $250,000 annually by developing and managing the automation of fund reports, and he oversaw the redesign of the company’s web presence for greater usability. He also helped navigate through the turmoil of 9/11.

John Gevers Photography & New Media Brew, Inc.

In 2002, John founded New Media Brew and John Gevers Photography, channeling decades of training, travel, and experience into a full-time creative practice. He received numerous awards for excellence in image capture, storytelling, and editing, including Telly Awards, and his productions have been featured in CBS News documentaries.

John’s photographic philosophy is rooted in a deep humanist impulse. Inspired by Ansel Adams, Henri Cartier-Bresson, and the celebrated Fort Wayne–born brothers Peter and David Turnley—with whom he has studied—he seeks to reveal the inner light of every subject. “To breathe in and out with my subjects, to get to know their motivations, and then to capture a moment that reflects their true selves defines me as both humanist and spiritualist,” John says. “It’s the light within each of us that I seek to reveal in photography.”

His fine art giclée and aluminum sublimation prints are held in private collections and displayed in organizations that share his worldview. Once repped by the Fort Wayne Museum of Art, his book of photography and his artwork are now available by contacting him directly at john@johngevers.com.

John is twice the recipient of the Individual Artist Grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Indiana Arts Commission. His 2017 grant supported focus, a retrospective exhibition spanning 30 years of image-making and storytelling. Notable clients include the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Harvard Business School, Harvard Law School and the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice, HBO Documentary Films, Enterprise Corporation of the Delta, and Mixed Greens Children’s Vegetable Project.

Landscape & Horticulture

Long before photography became his primary vocation, John was cultivating the land. In 1978, at just eighteen, he founded Green Jeans, a landscape maintenance business he grew to serve residential and commercial clients before closing it in 1985 when college took him to the Bloomington, Indiana, campus of Indiana University. Since 1990, he has personally planned, planted, and maintained the landscapes of private residences, earning “best of” awards along the way.

As a volunteer with Stillwater Hospice in Southwest Fort Wayne, Indiana, John planned and executed a reclamation and enhancement project for an Indiana native prairie on the organization’s grounds—working collaboratively with others to achieve both short- and long-term ecological goals. This work reflects a lifelong ethic of stewardship toward the natural world. John volunteered too well, and Stillwater hired him into his early retirement “gig” which he works to this day, enhancing and maintaining the 8-acre campus with a focus on native species and habitat.

In 2022, he became a certified Indiana Master Naturalist through the Indiana DNR program, and to this day, there is no place John would rather be than outdoors in nature.

Community Involvement

Community has always been central to John’s identity. He has served on the Embassy Theatre Board of Directors (2017–2020), the Boys & Girls Club Board (1995–1998), and currently serves on Stillwater Hospice’s Inclusion & Access Committee. He has been involved with refugee support initiatives and neighborhood board and safety efforts, and in 2011 was recognized as a Top 101 NE Indiana Connector by IPFW and Leadership Fort Wayne. 

Core Strengths

Across every role and endeavor, a consistent set of strengths has defined John’s contributions. He is a gifted communicator—written, verbal, and visual—who excels at translating complex ideas into clear, compelling language. He is a natural problem-solver who has repeatedly identified unmet needs within organizations and created new programs or positions to address them. He leads with empathy, nurturing and motivating collaborators toward shared goals, and brings an abiding commitment to the natural environment and to the people and communities he serves. Self-motivated, ethical, and detail-oriented, John is never more at home than when working at the intersection of artistry and purpose.