Russ Bray is a first-year photojournalism master's student at the University of Missouri. After completing his Bachelor of Fine Arts in photography at Missouri State University in 2023, he took a gap year to find his path in this field since he had little experience in photojournalism, and was selected for the Eddie Adams Workshop and Mountain Photo Workshop during that time. After being in such a specialized community, he knew he needed to learn more and dive deep into this field through a master's program, as he can't imagine himself in any other role to serve his communities. Growing up in an impoverished environment, he wants to be able to make work highlighting individuals in what is otherwise seen as numbers and statistics in underrepresented groups.