Two images of Advanced Photo student sophomore Kaela Fox, one in all black, one in white, pull a central portrait of Fox in two different directions.
This photographic illusion is one of many projects displayed in the Norseman Gallery’s past exhibit "Here’s Looking at You," closed Friday April 29, inspired by the idea of self-portraits through photography. This exhibit was definitely worth visiting.

"The goal of this project was to get the students to think about how they would normally take a portrait: sit facing the camera, smile and take the picture," photography teacher Margo Wixsom said. "The challenge was to be aware of the accepted expectations of a portrait, and not follow them."

The show consists of both advanced and beginning photography students from Wixsom’s classes. At the beginning of the portraits unit, Wixsom invited professional photographer Peter Fox to teach the students to disregard the conventional form of portrait photography.

In the Norseman Gallery, flyers are scattered about explaining the project. "Conventional portraits follow a series of ‘unspoken rules’ directing how we picture ourselves … look at the camera — straight on eye level perspective; face the camera — shoulders parallel standing at attention; center the subject — emphasis on putting everything in the middle; balance – symmetrical and vertical or horizontal; gesture — posed and stiff, holding still and ‘waiting’ for the click."

In the workshop, Fox taught the students to wait for the subject to relax into a natural position for them before taking the picture. This, Fox explained, makes the picture turn out more natural and realistic.

"We are so used to making sure our face looks great, and to smile when we are about to have our picture taken, but a portrait doesn’t always have to be the face," Wixsom said. "I wanted to get the students to get away from the ‘supposed to’ photos."

After Fox demonstrated how much better the photo looked when the subject is relaxed compared to a "posed" picture, Wixsom had the students look at the web site "The Mirror Project" at www.themirrorproject.com.

"The students spent almost the whole period looking at the examples up on the site," Wixsom said. "There are some great techniques on there for them to use."

"[For my photo] I decided to focus on my friend Roxanne Pinto’s hair," advanced photography student junior Melody Gaal said. "Her hair tells a story, and I wanted to convey that. At first the picture was too real, so I used crapas [pastels] to make highlights. This created a surreal image on a gold background."

Most of the portraits are in black-and-white, although there are several color photos. In some pictures the camera is visible through the use of mirrors, and gives the sense of someone watching the subject.

"Since the project was a self-portrait, I put my family in the foreground, with a reflection of me in the background." said advanced Photo sophomore Leland Takamine. "I wanted to show how my family is important."

Other students used broken glass to reflect their faces, and others made themselves transparent with the background showing through. With a mix of color and black and white, the possibilities are endless.

"I painted on top of a photo to create a mix between reality and art. I tried to enhance the texture and see only parts of the black and white photo," said sophomore Vanessa Pan. "The best photos are not posed."

This wonderful exhibit is unfortunately now closed, in order to make way for the next exhibit. For those students who missed out, be sure to look at the upcoming display when it appears in the Norseman Gallery . For now, the specific date for the opening of the exhibit is unknown, so look out for flyers.