Jan Banning was born in the Netherlands in 1954, from Dutch-East-Indies parents. He studies social and economic history at the university of Nijmegen. He has been working as a photographer since 1981. His work, rooted in both art and journalism, has been exhibited and published widely in books, magazines and newspapers. The central concern in his work is the theme of state power; Banning has produced series on the long-term consequences of war and the world of government bureaucracy. Currently he is working on a portrait series of World War II « comfort women » in Indonesia. Aside from Dutch, Banning is fluent in English, German and Spanish, speaks French reasonably well, and speaks some Portuguese and Indonesian.

Selected Exhibitions
- Bureaucratics, Perspektivet Museum (Tromso, Norway, 2009).
- Bureaucratics, Cicero, Galerie für politische Fotografie (Berlin, 2008/09).
- Bureaucratics, De Kunsthal (rotterdam, 2008).
- Bureaucratics, New York Photo Festival (in : Typologies,curated by Martin Parr, 2008).
- Bureaucratics, Cencrem (Centro Nacional de Conservacion y Museologia Havana, Cuba, 2007)

Selected books
- 2008 : - Bureaucratics, ed. Martin Parr.
- 2005 : Traces of war : survivors of the Burma and Sumatra Railways (Trolley Books, London)

Selected magazin and newspapers
- ‘M’ Magazine
- The Guardian Weekend
- The Independent
- L’Espresso
- Le Monde
- Liberation