David Barreda is an editor of photos and visuals at First Look Media. He was the founding Visuals Editor at ChinaFile, a post he held through December 2016. He has more than 15 years of media experience, spanning digital media to traditional wet lab darkroom experience. He previously worked as a staff photojournalist at the San Jose Mercury News, the Rocky Mountain News, the Valley News, and the Herald of Randolph. He holds a Masters degree in journalism from the University of Missouri and studied Geography and Environmental Studies at Middlebury College. He lives in Brooklyn, New York and has been to China three times.

Last Updated: January 17, 2017

Infographics

01.09.15

Think Renting in Your City is Bad? Try Beijing

David M. Barreda from Sohu
Compared with the numbers of a few years ago, first and second tier cities in China have an oversupply of stock on the housing market. Additionally, restrictions on multiple-home purchases are easing and “expected to be eased completely,” according...

Infographics

12.05.14

China’s Fallen Mighty [Graphic]

David M. Barreda, Youyou Zhou & more
Over the past thirty-eight years, twelve of China’s top leaders have been purged. This infographic and the bios of these leaders explain how and why these mighty men fell. Download the high-resolution graphic.

Features

12.05.14

China’s Fallen Mighty [Updated]

Ouyang Bin, Zhang Mengqi & more
Political infighting and purges have been hallmarks of the Chinese Communist Party since its earliest days but came to a peak during Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution, damaging the country and paralyzing the Party itself. When Mao died in 1976, it...

Infographics

07.03.14

Spoils of the ‘Tiger’ Hunt

David M. Barreda & Yan Cong
The Chinese Communist Party announced the expulsion from its ranks of Xu Caihou, who before his retirement in 2012 was one of the highest ranking officers in the People’s Liberation Army. He also became the highest-ranking member of the Chinese...

Infographics

03.20.14

Tiger, Tiger, Burning Bright

Isaac Stone Fish & David M. Barreda from EG365
The greatest unsolved mystery in China right now is not the disappearance of Malaysian airliner MH370 but the fate of Zhou Yongkang, the feared former head of China’s security apparatus. From 2007 to 2012 a member of China’s top political body, the...

Media

02.14.14

A Kapital Idea

Matthew Niederhauser & David M. Barreda
Matthew Neiderhauser is a photographer and artist whose work is influenced by his studies in anthropology. He lived in Beijing for six years and recently returned to the United States. His pictorial book Sound Kapital, published in 2009, documented...

Features

10.25.13

Bo Xilai May Have Gotten Off Easy

Ouyang Bin, Zhang Mengqi & more
On October 25, the Shandong High People’s Court rejected the appeal of Bo Xilai, the former Party Secretary of Chongqing who on September 22 was convicted of bribe-taking, embezzlement, and abuse of power and sentenced to life in prison.At the end...

Postcard

08.08.13

Portraits of the Faceless

Katharina Hesse & David M. Barreda
Nine years ago, photographer Katharina Hesse began to make portraits of North Korean defectors. To protect their identities she asked only that they “give something” of themselves to the photographs. Her subjects bury their faces in their hands, or...

Infographics

06.27.13

Are China’s “Losers” Really Winning?

Claire Zhang & David M. Barreda from Sohu
“Diaosi” originated as an insult for a poor, unattractive young person who stayed at home all day playing video games, with dim prospects for the future—a “loser.” Yet as the term went viral on the Internet, Chinese youth from all backgrounds began...

Infographics

04.09.13

China, North Korea, and Nuclear Arms

Ouyang Bin, David M. Barreda & more
As tensions again escalate on the Korean Peninsula, ChinaFile examines more than a decade of developments in North Korea’s nuclear armaments program. We begin our timeline in late 2002, when China first joined diplomatic discussions, paving the...

Infographics

02.03.13

Where Does Beijing’s Pollution Come From?

David Wertime & David M. Barreda from Sohu
In January alone, a stifling and noxious haze twice enveloped the Chinese capital of Beijing, pushing air quality indexes literally off the charts and inciting widespread outrage both on-line and off. Pollution—and the outcry surrounding it—has...