has been a staff photojournalist for the San Jose Mercury News since 2000. She spent the previous 17 years at the Detroit Free Press, and did a brief stint freelancing in southern California before coming to San Jose. Born in New York City and raised in Dayton, Ohio, she graduated from the University of Michigan in 1977 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history. Before working at the Free Press, she worked for the Trenton (N.J.) Times.
In January Pauline was sent to the Persian Gulf on assignment for Knight Ridder, which was combining the resources of all of its papers in order to send teams of photographers and writers to cover the war.
During the war she was one of the unilateral journalists covering the conflict independently of the military. Her work focused on the impact of the war on Iraqi civilians.
Pauline also covered the first Gulf War for Knight Ridder, photographing refugees in Jordan who had fled Kuwait when Iraq invaded. Following the war she traveled to Kuwait and southern Iraq to cover the aftermath.
She has also covered international stories in Cuba, Russia, the Middle East, Japan, South Korea, Cambodia and Eastern Europe.
Much of her domestic work has been self-generated photojournalism often focusing on aging, the Right to Die, poverty and drug addiction. Lubens was a Pulitzer finalist in 1991 for a team entry documenting the U.S. visit of South African leader Nelson Mandela and has twice won awards for feature picture stories in the annual National Press Photographers Association's Pictures of the Year contest. She was also named Michigan Photographer of the Year twice.