A photo exhibit representing both visual and poetic narratives of Tropical Storm Irene

(To see a slide show of the exhibit, check back on this post tomorrow.)

This past Fall I offered a free photography class at Artistree Gallery in Woodstock, Vermont to residents of the Upper Valley region to help people share their stories of the flooding in the aftermath of Irene.   With six very engaged students, we spent seven weeks taking and looking at photos, telling our stories, and designing and hanging an exhibit.

This class was an experiment for me.  I’ve taught the photography part of the class under the title “Seeing with New Eyes”.  I’ve taught storytelling as part of my work as a public speaking coach.  But I’ve never combined them together.  And yet, when you think about it, there’s often a strong storytelling component to photography.

In this class we had the opportunity to explore our respective experiences of the flooding of Irene and its aftermath.  We did so through the images we had captured during and immediately after the storm and through the stories that we shared.

To capture the essence of the narrative of our stories, we wrote simple nine-word poems from our personal experience, the perspective of some aspect of the storm (eg, the river, the rain, a bridge, the silt), and finally from the perspective our communities.

The combination of finding photos to reflect our narratives and honing the poems to capture the essence of our experience was a profound dive into our personal and shared experiences.

All the while, through weekly class assignments, we were honing our ability to really to see the visual possibilities of what’s immediately in front of us, and to find a way to convey what we find most interesting photographically.

The Images of Irene exhibit at the Artistree Gallery, which opened last Friday, reflects both aspects of this class.  Through images and poems we reflect our personal and universal expressions of Irene and its effect on our selves, our communities and our land.  In the galleries upstairs we are exhibiting examples derived from our new way of seeing the world through our class exercises.

The profits from sales of prints will be donated to the Sustainable Woodstock Flood Relief Fund.

As it turns out, this exhibit has captured a lot of interest in the community.  Three regional newspapers are running articles about the show. An organizer for another fund-raising event has approached me to explore how we might bring elements of this show to that event.  The opening reception last Friday night was packed, with many people saying they wanted to come back so that they could spend more time with each cluster of images and poems.

Probably most gratifying to me (particularly in light of the purpose of this blog, Meaningful-Conversations) was the comment of one visitor at the reception who said that she was so impressed with how each of the clusters in the show seemed to invite strangers to talk with each other about their own experiences.

Hearts were touched.  Conversations were started. Connections were made.