Society for Photographic Education

2025 Students Exhibition

Bigger & Better

October 10-12, 2025

Tarleton State University

IPE Building | Fort Worth, Texas

JUROR'S STATEMENT

People and process. People and process. I realized I was repeating these words again and again as I was selecting the images for this show. (I love alliteration.) Whether it was the presence or the absence of people, I found myself wanting to know more of their stories. Who were they looking at (was it me?), where had they been, why had they gone? And spaces documented without physical human presence told stories of what was and what might have been, framing the fragments of some imagined existence. The potential narratives held in still images will always fascinate me, and the selections here are no exception, from soft focus and blur obscuring narrative details to reflections, multiple exposures, and constructed realities that belie a definitive reading.

I also found myself returning to those photographs that had something to say about photography itself: the golden hour, a frame within a frame, the photograph as an object, and evidence of light-sensitive emulsions. Beyond the stories in these images are the meta-narratives of photography’s inception, our shared history as makers, the wink and nod of knowing how an image came to be.

A different juror would engage with these photographs differently, ask different questions, and select different stories, so please don’t be discouraged if your work didn’t fit into the narrative I’ve created. Overall, I am so encouraged by all the submissions and the future of SPE SouthCentral as students become professionals, teachers, and leaders in our organization. Thank you for sharing your work with me! I am so grateful to share in this chapter of your storytelling lives.

John Yates
Cyanotype on Glass

Hudson Woodring
Peadar O'Donnell's

Jo Wolfe
Banquet

Shannon Smith
Reflections

Shannon Smith
The White Sweater

Ginger Gore Russell
Daughter of Eve

Ginger Gore Russell
Life's A Gas

Bailey Rigby
Untitled

Molly Patrick
A Painter's Mind

Maedeh Ojaghloo
Unseen Light

Joshua Mokry
The Cave

Tara Lyon
Yellow Dog Window, PA

Fatima Loyola
Old and New

Olivia Logan
No Outlet

Charlie King
Untitled 13

Evelyn Kennedy
A Two Way Mirror #1

Evelyn Kennedy
A Two Way Mirror #2

James Hilty
Clear Above

Maryam Ghasempour Siahgaldeh
In Caged

Maryam Ghasempour Siahgaldeh
Exiled Glances

Fatemeh Fani
Left Behind

Amber Escalante
Untitled One

Breanna Dempsey
Awake in a Dream

Edem Dake
Home (Dake Residence, Parakuo Estates)

Joaquin Campos
Last Evening

Sam Boeck
Evergreen

Donatto Barra
Look

Diane Durant

JUROR

Diane Durant (b. 1978) works with image, text, and found objects to tell true stories, from remaking childhood moments to exploring familial relationships and societal expectations through humor (and trophies). She is a graduate of Baylor University (BFA '01), Dallas Theological Seminary (MA/BC '04), and the University of Texas at Dallas (MA '07, PhD '13) where she currently holds the position of Professor of Instruction and Director of the Marilyn & Jerry Comer Collection of Photography. Diane is a member of both the Board of Directors for the Dallas Wings Community Foundation and Texas Photographic Society. Her photographs have been exhibited nationally and internationally; appeared online at Aint-Bad, Don't Smile, Lenscratch, Insider, and T, the New York Times Style Magazine; featured in print with Chronicles and Sun Magazine; and belong to the permanent collection of the National Park Service. Her creative writing has appeared in Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, RiverSedge, di-verse-city, the Texas Poetry Calendar, Stymie, The Spectacle, The Ekphrastic Review, Slackjaw, Frazzled, and McSweeney's. She is the former president of 500X Gallery in Dallas and past editor of The Grassburr, The Rope, Sojourn, and Reunion: The Dallas Review. In 2018, Diane was named one of four inaugural Carter Community Artists with the Amon Carter Museum of American Art in Fort Worth. Her first monograph, Stories, 1986–88, was released by Daylight Books in 2020. To her credit, she's never eaten a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and fully intends to keep it that way.