John C. Mack

• Name — John C. Mack • Education — Duke University • Occupation — Photographer, writer

Mack served as production assistant in Antarctica on the IMAX documentary film The Endurance: Shackleton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition, and began shooting photography thereafter. In 2002 he moved to Mexico to work, leading to his 2005 collaboration with Susanne Steines as co-author and photographer of the book Xibalbá: Lost Dreams of the Mexican Rainforest.

In 2021, Mack founded the Life Calling Initiative, a not-for-profit organization responding to an increasing reliance on technology, and the challenges this reliance presents to people. The organization's mission is to preserve people's humanity by developing educational strategies to avert dangers of the Digital Age.[1] This is achieved through awareness campaigns, education, art, lectures, and programming.

One project of the Life Calling Initiative was A Species Between Worlds, an interactive immersive exhibition of artworks by Mack in New York City in 2022. A Species Between Worlds is a gamified examination of the intersection of humanity and technology.[2] Mack was inspired by the Pokémon Go craze and YouTube footage which captured a "Pokémon stampede" in Taipei in 2016.[3] A Species Between Worlds uses augmented-reality (AR) artwork from Pokémon GO spliced with Mack's photography. Mack spent five years photographing the seven wonders of the natural world as well as over 50 national parks. The exhibition used this artwork and an application which guides visitors through a gamified psychological exploration framed by the artifice of the Pokémon Go interface.

Revealing Mexico was released in 2010 and exhibited in Rockefeller Center's Channel Gardens in New York City that year. Mack photographed everyday Mexican life for its celebrations of 2010, both the bicentennial anniversary of Mexico's independence from Spain and the centennial anniversary of the Mexican Revolution.[4] In addition to the anniversary, given the emphasis in the international press on ongoing violence between the state and narcoterrorism, a need existed to depict a more balanced and holistic impression of the country. The book includes black-and-white photographs encompassing each of the 31 states and portraits of Mexican writers, business icons, artists, academics and actors.

• 2022: Mack was named as one of fifty people "changing the world who the world needs to know about" by The Explorers Club.[5]

Mack llives in Seville, Spain.[6]