Caroline Hickman Vaughan

Caroline Hickman Vaughan was born on June 3, 1949, and passed away on October 27, 2025. Born at Duke Hospital to Mary Hickman Vaughan and William Thomas Vaughan, she resided in Durham until 2018 when she moved to Hillsborough, North Carolina with her wife Jane and their two Wheaten Terriers Murphy and Lucy. She received her B.A. in English from Duke University studying with Reynolds Price and William Blackburn. Caroline added photography to her course curriculum studying with John Menapace and becoming one of the three co-founders of Latent Image, the first student publication dedicated to fine art photography. After graduation she traveled to San Francisco to meet her heroine Imogen Cunningham who told her to do something productive and not teach! Caroline went on to study with Minor White at MIT and later was listed in the Time Life Photography Year-1977 as one of the 43 most promising young photographers in the world. In her young career she also worked with Murray Riss at the Penland School where in 2007 she returned to teach a portrait course, contrary to Cunningham’s wishes.

Caroline was an extraordinary photographer best known for her classic black-and-white photographs of a wide range of subjects including landscapes and the human form, still lifes and intimate portraits all created with a Deardorff view camera and printed with platinum, palladium, gelatin silver and Polaroid media. Her prints were nuanced and lyrical masterpieces. Keeping up with the times her recent photographs were made with a Nikon digital camera and her iPhone. Caroline’s photographs are in many private collections as well as the Amon Carter Museum; the North Carolina Museum of Art; the Nasher Museum and the Gregg Museum of Art & Design which also houses the Caroline Hickman Vaughan Archives. She also recently created an extensive website of much of her photography and poetry carolinehickmanvaughan.com. Her publications include Borrowed Time: Photographs by Caroline Vaughan, Duke Press Durham and London, 1996; Quartet, Four North Carolina Photographers (Rob Amberg, Elizabeth Matheson and John Rosenthal) Safe Harbor Books, 2005; and Latent Image, Duke University Fine Arts Magazine, 1971. She was also featured in Camera Work, ZOOM and Aperture publications.

Caroline went to heroic lengths to capture an image and currently at the Gregg on exhibit is a recent digital color photograph Moon Flower, 2020. She grew the flower from seed on her back deck and then over several weeks would venture out night after night to capture the flower’s opening at just the right moment. Photographer Elizabeth Matheson recently took a quick portrait of Caroline and Jane at a reception. When thanked for the beautiful image she replied, “I didn’t take the photo, Caroline told me exactly what to do, and she was right.” Another colleague, M. J. Sharp mentioned on Instagram that when she was a young photographer and was working in a camera store, she remembers when Caroline Vaughan came in it was like Elvis had entered the building. M. J. excitedly told Caroline of a new high contrast printing paper available. Caroline was not impressed and told M. J. “grade 3 paper is for people who don’t know how to process their negatives properly.” M.J. went on to say, “Caroline was a very exacting Peter Pan and having real live photo heroes living in the area was so important to young photographers since we were so, so far from her level of artistry and expertise, but she showed us what was possible.” Ippy Patterson summarized Caroline, “On one side that sharp edge and on the other the warmth of her heart.” Caroline’s spirit was generous and compassionate and now lives on with countless stories to be shared by her friends and colleagues.

In addition to her distinguished career as a photographer she returned to writing in 2017. Caroline received four honorable mentions for her fiction from Glimmer Train and the Doris Betts Contest. In 2022 she won an international poetry award and her poem Death Came Twice was published in VO(I)CES II by Victorina Press, 2024.

Caroline is survived by her wife, Jane Hamborsky; best friend Patsy Bailey; adopted big sister, Elizabeth Matheson; Dr. Joan Jordan and wife Louise Fredericksen (Godparents to Murphy and.
Lucy); Brother-in-law, Douglas Hamborsky and wife Rhonda Hamborsky; nephew Sean Hamborsky and wife Angela Hamborsky; niece, Nicole St. John Hamborsky; Jason Hinton and wife Megan Hinton and children Eve, Logan and Eliza; as well as an abundance of friends.

In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church Faith & the Arts program or the Gregg Museum of Art & Design Caroline Hickman Vaughan Archives.

A celebration of life service and interment will be held at 3 p.m. Friday, November 21, 2025, at St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church, Hillsborough, North Carolina.