MTSU’s Baldwin Photographic Gallery is showcasing three students’ senior projects from the university’s Photography Capstone course alongside their peers’ work in the annual Student Photography Show.
Projects by seniors Spencer Bird, Thomas Meadow and Makayla Stovall are the focus of the new exhibit in the Baldwin Gallery, which opened shortly before spring 2021 classes ended.
The gallery, part of the university’s College of Media and Entertainment, is open to guests. The student exhibit concludes Sept. 9.
In the exhibit, Bird, a video and film production major from Medon, Tennessee, who graduated in May, addresses the effect American isolationism is having on individuals and how it can impede progress in his project, called “American Ego.”
Meadow, a photo major from Murfreesboro who plans to graduate this summer, focuses on how truth can lead us to revise our memories — or not – in his project, “The Longing.”
Stovall, a photography major from Jackson, Tennessee, who’s on track to graduate this fall, is reimagining the future through a Black lens in “The Future Begins,” her project that reunites African Americans with the cultures from which they were taken.
During their semester in the Photography Capstone course, MTSU seniors use the skills and concepts they’ve developed to create a project, in consultation with their professor, that will become a part of the Baldwin Gallery’s annual student photography exhibit. The course is generally offered only during spring semesters.
MTSU photography majors currently earn a Bachelor of Science in Media and Entertainment with a photography concentration through the college’s Department of Media Arts.
In April, however, the university’s Board of Trustees approved an independent bachelor’s degree for the program, creating a Bachelor of Science in Photography. MTSU can begin offering the new bachelor’s degree this summer with the approval of the Tennessee Higher Education Commission.
More information about MTSU’s photography program is available at https://www.mtsu.edu/programs/photography.
The exhibit is on display weekdays from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., when classes are in session, through Sept. 9, in Room 269 of the university’s Bragg Media and Entertainment Building at 1735 Blue Raider Drive. The Baldwin Gallery is located at the top of the stairwell in the building’s central courtyard.
Gallery guests must wear masks and observe appropriate distancing and other posted MTSU health safety protocols during their visit.
A campus parking map is available at http://tinyurl.com/MTSUParking2020. Off-campus guests visiting the Baldwin Gallery should obtain a special one-day permit from MTSU’s Office of Parking and Transportation at https://www.mtsu.edu/parking/visit.php.
Public tours can be arranged by contacting gallery curator Shannon Randol, who also is an assistant professor of photography in the Department of Media Arts, at [email protected].
For more information about MTSU’s Baldwin Photographic Gallery, visit http://baldwinphotogallery.com or http://www.facebook.com/BaldwinPhotoGallery. To learn more about the College of Media and Entertainment, visit http://mtsu.edu/media.
