Best of Show: Bre & Josh by Courtney Garvin
Honorable Mentions: 4:17 p.m. by Jenna Petruzziello, Mariah by Elizabeth Olson, and The Couch by Sarah Kearns

Light Work is pleased to announce the 2016 Transmedia Photography Annual exhibition, featuring photographs by seniors from the Art Photography program in the Department of Transmedia within College of Visual and Performing Arts at Syracuse University.

The exhibition will be on view in the Jeffrey J. Hoone Gallery from January 19 through March 10, 2016. A reception on occasion of the 2016 Transmedia Photography Annual and Mary Mattingly: Mass and Obstruction—on view in Light Work’s Kathleen O. Ellis Gallery—will take place on Wednesday, January 27 from 5-7pm. Refreshments will be served; the event is free and open to the public.

Exhibiting students include: Allie Chernick, Courtney Garvin, Rachel Glynn, Hana Katz, Sarah Kearns, Shelley Kendall, Maddie McNamara, Elizabeth Olson, Jenna Petruzziello, and Meg Stahl.

Alexa Dilworth, publishing director and senior editor at the Center for Documentary Studies (CDS) at Duke University, served as juror to select images for “Best of Show” and “Honorable Mention.” “Best of Show” went to Courtney Garvin, and “Honorable Mentions” went to Jenna Petruzziello, Elizabeth Olson, and Sarah Kearns. According to Dilworth:

Looking through the photographs in this year’s Light Work Transmedia Photography Annual, I began to think about ideas of self and representation. How does the way a photographer views the world reveal itself in just a few images? I was surprised at how few pictures it takes to begin to feel in sympathy with the observer—rather than who or what is observed. A sustained emotion, sensibility, or awareness in beholding others and regarding (inner and outer) landscapes carries across this collection of photographs, which are accomplished and convincing. In the end, after considering these works multiple times, I chose the images that resonated most with me, that I couldn’t shake.

The photo I chose as Best in Show, Courtney Garvin’s Bre & Josh, wouldn’t let me go. I kept thinking about it. The intensity of the sitters’ gaze—how they hold the photographer in their own respective lenses. There’s both fierceness and tenderness in the way they occupy their seats, holding their positions and each other’s hand. They look both skeptical and connected. I’m always taken by portraits in which a potent exchange is taking place, an interaction that can’t entirely be pinned down. The photo is beautifully composed, carefully arranged—it possesses wonderful formal qualities but is full of activity. I admire Garvin’s skill and understanding.

Honorable Mentions Jenna Petruzzielo, Elizabeth Olson, and Sarah Kearns made photographs that called to me as well: the deep lyricism—both the specificity and diffuseness—of Petruzzielo’s 4:17 p.m., the whimsy and humor in Olson’s serious portrait of Mariah, and the solemnity and spirit of Kearns’s still life, The Couch.

Light Work’s close partnership with the Department of Transmedia provides Art Photography students with full access to our production facilities, lectures, and workshops. Many students have worked with Light Work throughout their undergraduate careers, and have become an integral source of the energy, passion, and excitement that defines our organization. The Light Work staff and community congratulate all of the seniors on their accomplishments, and wish them the best in their bright futures within the field of Photography.

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The Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Art Photography emphasizes creativity, intellectual development, and the acquisition of skills to build professional, technical, and visual abilities within the broad and varied field of Photography. Art Photography students exhibit their work nationally; and establish careers working with museums, magazines, fashion, advertising, photo studios, art galleries, educational institutions, and other visual industries.

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Alexa Dilworth is publishing director and senior editor at the Center for Documentary Studies (CDS) at Duke University, where she also directs the awards program, which includes the CDS/Honickman First Book Prize in Photography, the CDS Documentary Essay Prize in Writing and Photography, and the Dorothea Lange–Paul Taylor Prize. In 1995 she was hired by CDS to work on the editorial staff for DoubleTake magazine. She was also hired as editor of the CDS books program at that time and has coordinated the publishing efforts for every CDS book—including the recent publications Aunties: The Seven Summers of Alevtina and Ludmila: Photographs by Nadia Sablin; Legendary: Inside the House Ballroom Scene: Photographs by Gerard H. Gaskin; One Place: Paul Kwilecki and Four Decades of Photographs from Decatur County, Georgia; Iraq | Perspectives: Photographs by Benjamin Lowy; and American Studies: Photographs by Jim Dow. Dilworth has a B.A. and an M.A., both in English, from the University of Florida, and an M.F.A. in creative writing (poetry) from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa.