Join North Island College (NIC)’s Professional Photography students this Friday at the Courtenay and District Museum for the opening of the program’s 14th showing of student work.
The event marks the second collaboration between the museum and the photography program by utilizing the spacious second-floor gallery.
Karley Bracey, Lindsey Cain, Christian Campbell, Trina Cary, Caitlyn Chapman, Robin Conrad, Jamie Davidson, Dan Delucry, Yolanda Drummond, Mike Leblanc and Danica Worrall will display personal favourites, as well as images created especially for the show. The secret to success of a group show is a rich variety of talent, and these enthusiastic, dedicated students have clearly met the challenge.
As diverse as the regions of Canada from which they come, the students’ reasons for choosing photography as a career vary widely. All, however, have been captivated by the visual expression and lure of a medium that continues to evolve and dominate our lives.
Sky, water and land define the Comox Valley, and two students offer very different approaches to each element.
Jamie Davidson spent his youth growing up along the shores of Lake Superior and much of his adulthood as an aviator. His classical, crisp black and white landscapes reveal a lifelong fascination with the shoreline environment.
Yolanda Drummond, on the other hand, has captured the natural elements through painstaking studio photography intent on rendering their essence through visual design. Her striking, large images aren’t just "captured moments" but are carefully conceived and meticulously crafted.
Continuing with studio shooting, Danica Worrall has carefully designed, propped and lighted still life, fabricated images. Influenced by the work of Ditte Tsager, Worrall emphasizes compositional arrangements and the application of light to reveal mood. She wants viewers to look at each image and feel as though they could reach out and touch what they see.
The sharp-edged patterns of frozen ice have caught the eye of Dan Delucry, who has captured a striking series of nature’s inherent designs. While out walking his dogs one cold wintry morning, Delucry couldn’t ignore the etched surfaces of frozen puddles and ditches. To increase the visual variety of each composition, he added bold colour tints.
The realm of portraiture can be as varied as its subjects or the photographer’s imagination, and several students have applied their own interpretations.
Trina Cary presents a three-piece series titled Jackie; an artist, a sister and a close friend. During the April evening outdoor shoot in Kelowna, the weather swerved from sun to snow, from blizzard to sun flare.
Although Lindsey Cain’s portrait sessions were snow-free, she intentionally propped her subjects with umbrellas of differing colours, sizes and styles. For effect, she posed each carefully-attired model in various settings ranging from bridges to meadows.
Caitlyn Chapman’s images mark the mergence of portraiture, fashion and metaphor — a difficult challenge, but her effective attention to detail, posing and lighting has created an intriguing sense of luxury, flair and magic.
Establishing a mood of mystery and elegance is Robin Conrad’s goal with her three studio portraits of costumed and masked models. The theme is a masquerade ball at which party-goers hide their identities while playfully assuming new personas.
Playtime could well be the title if not the theme of Mike Leblanc’s richly-coloured High Dynamic Range images taken recently during the traveling carnival’s visit to Courtenay. Concentrating on the vivid colours and early evening light, he cropped tightly and bracketed exposures then processed the multi files in Photomatix software to create stunning 24-inch-by-36-inch prints.
Karley Bracey’s photographs, titled Garbage Gardens, juxtapose the unexpected with the predictable: the detritus discards of our society nurturing beauty and fragility. The unconventional gardens created probably would never be featured on any home and garden tour. Bracey acknowledges Art Knapp Nursery and the Campbell River Disposal Site for their support and co-operation.
Continuing the theme of incongruity, Christian Campbell has also assembled images that are definitely out of the ordinary: models dressed in “glam” placed in extraordinaire settings. Inspired by the surreal happenstances of life, he explores the complexities of some of our everyday encounters.
The show ends June 18. The Courtenay and District Museum is located at 360 Cliffe Ave., across the street corner from the Sid Williams Theatre. It is open Tuesday to Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Phone 250-334-0686 for further information.
— North Island College