Student’s Project
This time I would like to share with you, the work of some of my students. For the last two years I have been teaching a Basic Photography course at FotoGram in Amsterdam. The students themselves come from all over the world, have different occupations and backgrounds. However they all share one thing in common, an passionate interest in photography.
On the first day of class, I always ask them to introduce themselves and tell the rest of the class something about themselves and what they want or expect from the class. As you can imagine, they all want to become better at taking or rather making photographs. This is where I come in to help them along. On top of teaching them the fundamental disciplines, I also endeavor to infuse the students with my passion and to try to coax out them, their own feelings to be part of their image making. As I said earlier it is a basic photography course, thus their knowledge and experience is limited.
This past spring semester I was fortunate to have some exceptional students, if not in experience then in passion and talent. The work that you are about to look at is from their final assignment in the class. The assignment is a photo essay. The photos should all be connected to a single theme and relate to each other.
***note due to space on this site, I am not able to present all of the students assignments. There are just a few culled images from their assignments for presentation here.
The first student’s work is form Max D’Achille. Max is one of those people, that as the old saying goes, “brings a lot to the party”. He has a wonderful understanding and insight into what contributes to emotional impact. Max goes barefoot and apparently receives some criticism for it. Having been a teenager in the 60’s and growing up near Berkeley, California it really wasn’t anything new to me, but for some people. . . Max chose this part of his life style for his essay. What he does here is put into the images much of the criticisms and comments that he has received. The concept is brilliant and wonderfully executed.
Next is Miranda Roos an attorney and mother. Miranda chose a very simple theme, especially for a place like Amsterdam. The theme, bicycles! Yep bicycles. As if there are not enough in the Netherlands. However she took that and added to it just bicycle accessories and then added to that an emotional aspect to the overall theme, of one of neglect. It was obvious she put a lot of thought into this project to come up with a theme within a theme , within a theme.
Andrea Suponcic, a fellow American living abroad and whose job has her traveling all over the globe. Brought to the class an already developed eye for photography. In fact her photo of “Coney Island” took second place in a photo contest put on by the Foto Academy. Since she took it before the class and not of her assignment, I chose not to show it here. Andrea took two different subjects and spun out two excellent essays. One was of her passport and the other is of a bridge in Cologne, Germany, where people put padlocks with messages and affix them to the bridge’s chain link fence.
Karolina Kozkowsua, just floored me with her first assignment, which is really just an exercise in focus and depth of field. However what she did with it was astonishing. She framed her three subjects in such a way, that it can only be described as “elegant”. For her final assignment, she went to a graveyard in Poland and made some very moving images there of the statuary. Through the use of her elegant sense of design, she was able to breath life into these inanimate objects.
Cathy Jeary, who came to class sporting (if I recall correctly) three different point-and-shoot cameras. Most of the time these same cameras were unable to function because they had all run out of battery life. However she floored her classmates and myself, with the images she made on our field trip (unfortunately I do not have these to show). However believe me when I say they were all beautifully designed. For personal reasons she was unable to complete the final assignments, but did show up with a few images she had recently shot, here is one that we all found compelling.
Filiz Yilmaz showed up to class (along with Max) with a 50mm prime lens (a rare sight site these days from those just starting out in photography). The images she made from the weekly assignments (along with Max’s and my urging) provided enough stimulus for three of her classmates to go out and purchase 50mm primes. For her final class project, she had written me, that she was having troubles coming up an idea. With my usual comments, I wrote back and told her not to stress, but to have fun with it. It is apparent that was enough. She decided on”white” to be her theme. Using her eye for composition and excellent use of her 50mm prime, she came up with some very interesting and well made images. Placing white into her compositions with artistic flare.
Now just before I go to publish this blog entry, I have received two more student’s work.
The first of these are from Akansha Sharma. Akansha from India, progressed very well in the course. In truth was a fast learner. Also she was always making herself available as a volunteer model during class demonstrations and assignments. As a model, she was as good at that if not better. She presented two themes, and from those I have chosen another to exhibit here, as I see it. I will let you decide for yourself.
The last of my student’s work is from Beate Fortuna. Beate from the very beginning has exhibited an excellent eye and infuses her images with a great deal of symbolism. She had told me of her final project plans, however she was not able to accomplish those (not her fault) and then decided to go after another with very little time. Throughout the course Beate had worked in B&W, however towards the end, in my lecture on color and subsequent suggestion to visit a few web sites of great color photographers, she thus chose color to work in. Using the work of Pete Turner as her inspiration.
As a teacher, I must confess to being proud of their accomplishments. Not unlike that of a proud parent. This is what teaching is all about. Firing up your students with passion and inspiration along with the fundamental disciplines. Then having them come back with work that is in itself inspiring.