LOGO IMAGE

"My pictures are now of things that loom large in a different way, such as the importance of family and identity in a land that tries to assimilate outsiders. Through my artwork, I say black people are still very much here, just across the tracks, even if you have to search for us." -Jacob Austen-Breneman

The National Endowment for the Arts and the Southeast Museum of Photography offered a free three week master course for minority high school photography students, ages 16-18 during the Summer of 2007. The master course, titled Image and Identity helped students explore photography's role and function and how cultural conditions and context influence the meaning and execution of works of art.

Students participated in a series of related lectures and public seminars as well as individual instruction lead by three master artists: Carla Williams, Ray Robbennolt, and Kerry Stuart Coppin.

Each week, the students were introduced to new methods of critical thinking and communication techniques through visual language exercises, artistic processes, technical aspects of studio lighting and digital photographic skills. At the conclusion of the program, students participated in editing and organizing a final portfolio for the exhibition.

About the artists/teachers:

Carla Williams received her MFA in photography from the University of New Mexico at Albuquerque in 1996, an MA in Photography from the University of New Mexico at Albuquerque in 1999 and a BA in Art and Archaeology from Princeton University in 1996.  She is the editor for exposure journal: Society for Photographic Education, a writer and curator and has taught at the College of Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Ray Eduardo Ochoa Robbennolt received his MFA from the Visual Studies Workshop in Rochester, NY, in 1993 and a BFA from Rhode Island School of Design in 1983.  He has taught photography and critical and creative thinking at Camera Obscura in Tel Aviv, Israel as well as at LaGuardia Community College in Queens, NY and SUNY Brockport in Brockport, NY.

Kerry Stuart Coppin received an MFA at the Rhode Island School of Design and BFA from the Rochester Institute of Technology.   He is currently teaching at Brown University in Rhode Island and has previously taught at the University of Miami, Kansas State University, Rochester Institute of Technology and Columbia College, Chicago.