Chicago Photography Gallery
In one more year, October 2009 I will have been teaching Photography for 40 years. I remember the celebration we had when I was at my 30 year anniversary party. I remember thinking "where did I ever get the idea that I was afraid of commitment?" and "I guess I figured out what I'm going to do when I grow up."
This gallery is a showcase for Photographers that started out learning photography with me, usually in a Photo I class. I have had over 12,000 students during my years as a teacher. To the extent that a student reflects their teacher or teachers, I look at these photographs and think, "not bad", I have not wasted my time teaching all of these years.
You may have heard someone say "be careful, don't believe your own PR." What I'm most proud of as a teacher is my ability to not turn my students into clones of myself. Part of the way that I've done that is because I don't show or use my own photographs in my classes. I do not hold up my work as examples of excellent photography. Human nature is to imitate what you think is good. In the back of a student's mind, they might be thinking "if I do it like him, then I'll get it right." And everyone wants to "get it right" (me, too).
What I'm I most proud of? I am most proud of the fact that when one of my students, show their work, they have started to find their own "artistic center." If I've done my job, they are not anybody's clone, they are their own person.
As you look at this work you will see many different styles. My only part in the work is that I was there at the beginning of their photographer's journey. I was only there at the start. No one would stand up and say, "I taught Lance Armstrong how to ride a bike, because I put the training wheels on his bike when he was a kid."
These photographs are the work product of my students. That I was there at the start doesn't mean anything. The work is all theirs, the product of many hours of emotional angst and hard work. A good photographer does not take a picture, a good photographer makes a photograph. And so behold their work.
Richard Stromberg ;-)