Close Up: Photographer Ben Curtis

Ben Curtis is The Associated Press’ East Africa photographer based in Nairobi, Kenya.

Born in Oxford, England he graduated in law from the University of Sheffield and worked as a staff photographer for the UK Press Association in both London and Scotland, before joining the AP in 2003. 

Prior to his current position, he occupied the roles of photo editor and chief photographer for the Middle East based in Cairo, Egypt and West Africa photographer based in Dakar, Senegal.

He has covered assignments across the Middle East and Africa including conflicts in Libya, South Sudan, Liberia, Egypt, Gaza, Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, Ivory Coast and Kenya, as well as two Olympic Games.

His awards include World Press Photo 1st prize for spot news, Pictures of the Year International, Bayeux Award for War Correspondents, National Press Photographers Association, and the Atlanta Photojournalism Seminar.

Below is a selection of Curtis’ outstanding imagery.

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Click on any image to launch the Close Up: Photographer Ben Curtis gallery. 

A displaced boy mimics the photographer taking a picture of him, using a fake plastic jewel, at a United Nations compound which has become home to thousands of people displaced by the recent fighting, in the capital Juba, South Sudan Sunday, Dec. 29, 2013. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A mother, right, walks to have a family photograph taken with her son, center, seen reflected in a portrait of Nelson Mandela, outside the Mediclinic Heart Hospital where former South African President Nelson Mandela is being treated in Pretoria, South Africa Monday, July 8, 2013. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A supporter of main challenger and reformist candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, not wanting to be photographed, hides her face using a poster of him as she waits in the stands at an election rally at the Heidarnia stadium in Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, June 9, 2009. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Two-month-old orphaned baby elephant Ajabu is given a dust-bath in the red earth after being fed milk from a bottle by a keeper, as she is too young to do it herself, at an event to commemorate World Environment Day at the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust Elephant Orphanage in Nairobi, Kenya Wednesday, June 5, 2013. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Mexican diver Daniel Islas Arroyo trains at the 2012 Summer Olympics, Sunday, July 22, 2012, in London. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A young Rwandan girl sits amongst hundreds gathered at a ceremony to await the arrival of a small flame of remembrance, symbolic fire traveling the country, and hear genocide memories in the capital Kigali, Rwanda Saturday, April 5, 2014. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A displaced child struggles to carry a container of drinking water obtained from a truck across a slippery muddy patch of ground at a United Nations compound which has become home to thousands of people displaced by the recent fighting, in the capital Juba, South Sudan Sunday, Dec. 29, 2013. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Excited supporters cheer for South African President Jacob Zuma at a final African National Congress (ANC) election rally in the Soweto township of Johannesburg, South Africa Sunday May 4, 2014. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A man makes bubbles with two electric bubble-blowers at a day-long gathering of pro-Gadhafi soldiers and supporters, at dusk in Green Square, Tripoli, Libya Sunday, March 6, 2011. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A female protester wears a mask as she joins others to carry mock coffins and red-painted crosses, symbolizing the blood of the 28 non-Muslims singled out and killed in the recent attack on a bus in Mandera by Somali militant group al-Shabab, outside government offices in downtown Nairobi, Kenya Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Villagers spray the groom, Mohammed Zamanpour, 25, and his bride Manijeh, 16, with foam confetti at a Bakhtiari nomad wedding in the mountain village of Abid near the town of Masjid-e-Soleiman in southwestern Iran, Thursday, Nov. 29, 2007. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

In this photo taken Monday, Jan. 19, 2009, Fatma Zidane El-Banneh, 8, and her mother Azza are pictured after returning from the hospital to the Beit Lahiya Elementary Co-educational school, where Azhar said Fatma was burned by white phosphorus, which could not be independently verified, in Beit Lahiya, in the northern Gaza strip. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A wounded anti-government protester holds up his bloodied hand as he is carried by others back from clashes with pro-government supporters near the Egyptian Museum in downtown Cairo, Egypt, Thursday, Feb. 3, 2011. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A Palestinian woman from the Suboh family weeps as she is comforted after learning the body of a releative was dug out of the rubble of a house destroyed in recent days in Israeli bombardment in Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza strip, Monday, Jan. 19, 2009. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Palestinians offer traditional Muslim Friday prayers amidst the rubble of a destroyed mosque, where only the minaret still stands, in Beit Lahiya in the Gaza strip, Friday, Jan. 23, 2009. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Libyan rebel fighters pray in the desert on hearing claims from other rebels that an airstrike further up the road towards Brega had hit rebel forces killing at least two and injuring more than a dozen, at the west gate of Ajdabiya, Libya Thursday, April 7, 2011. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

The skulls and bones of some of those who were slaughtered as they sought refuge inside the church, are laid out on shelves in an underground vault as a memorial to the thousands who were killed in and around the Catholic church during the 1994 genocide in Nyamata, Rwanda, Friday, April 4, 2014. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Bizimana Emmanuel, who was born two years before the genocide, is consoled by an unidentified woman while attending a public ceremony to mark the 20th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide, at Amahoro stadium in Kigali, Rwanda Monday, April 7, 2014. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

In this photo taken Wednesday, March 26, 2014, Emmanuel Ndayisaba, left, who during the 1994 Rwandan genocide cut off with a machete the hand of Alice Mukarurinda, right, in the swamp where she was hiding and killed her baby girl, but who are now friends, recount their experiences of the genocide at Alice’s house in Nyamata, Rwanda. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Rwandan children listen and pray during a Sunday morning service at the Saint-Famille Catholic church, the scene of many killings during the 1994 genocide, in the capital Kigali, Rwanda Sunday, April 6, 2014. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

One of the few to have a mosquito net, a displaced family who fled the recent fighting between government and rebel forces in Bor by boat across the White Nile, sit under it after waking up in the morning in the town of Awerial, South Sudan Thursday, Jan. 2, 2014. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A group of Maasai women arrive to support the young warriors from their village at the annual Maasai Olympics in the Sidai Oleng Wildlife Sanctuary near Mt Kilimanjaro, in southern Kenya Saturday, Dec. 13, 2014. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A Chadian soldier wearing reflective sunglasses observes the convoy ahead of him, as Chadian soldiers who are fighting in support of Central African Republic president Francois Bozize, ride on the road leading to Damara, about 70km (44 miles) north of the capital Bangui, Central African Republic Wednesday, Jan. 2, 2013. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A Kenyan man sits in the cab of a destroyed truck used as a makeshift roadblock while a tyre burns on the roof, as he and others enforce the roadblock in Kisumu, Kenya, Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2008. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

A mourner wearing a banner as a skirt showing the face of South African President Jacob Zuma observes the scene from a hilltop overlooking the burial site of Nelson Mandela in Qunu, South Africa Sunday, Dec. 15, 2013. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Displaced people who fled the recent fighting between government and rebel forces in Bor by boat across the White Nile, prepare to sleep in the open at night in the town of Awerial, South Sudan Wednesday, Jan. 1, 2014. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

Gift Mapuka, who described himself as a “Global Mission Pioneer” from the Seventh-day Adventist Church, preaches on his own about Jesus and Nelson Mandela, in front of a wall of get-well messages and flowers left by well-wishers, outside the entrance to the Mediclinic Heart Hospital where former South African President Nelson Mandela is being treated in Pretoria, South Africa Friday, July 5, 2013. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

In this photo taken Wednesday, Nov. 21, 2012, a young schoolboy makes a handstand during a break in the yard of the Hot Courses Primary School, in the village of Nyumbani which caters to children who lost their parents to HIV, and grandparents who lost their children to HIV, with the bookend generations taking care of one another, in Kenya. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)

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