Society for Photographic Education
2005 National Conference Review

PASSAGE

42nd National Conference – March 17-20, 2005
Portland, Oregon at the Hilton Portland & Executive Towers

Smooth Passage
2005 SPE National Conference in Portland draws five-star reviews

From left: SPE Chair of the Board and Conference Committee Chair Terri Warpinski, Fuji representative D. John McCarthy and Keynote Speaker Barry Lopez join for a photograph

With apologies to Zagat, the following is a compendium review of the 42nd SPE National Conference which took place March 17-20, 2005 at the Hilton Portland and Executive Towers in downtown Portland, Oregon. Our theme this year was Passage in honor of the Bicentennial of Lewis & Clark’s journey to the Northwest. The total attendance came to 1,009, nearly matching last year’s record high, a terrific turnout for a location where most of our 21st century northwesterly passages were by air. Program Chair Phil Harris (“a wonderful MC”), Conference Committee Chair Terri Warpinski (“awesome leader”), and the amazing SPE staff and conference committee (“you guys were so organized”) built on the five strong conferences of the new millennium to create a highly acclaimed event in a beautiful city.

We surveyed the attendees of the conference by email and received more than 75 responses, many of them quite detailed and thoughtful. And now for the stunning poll results: Food 29 – Decor 26 – Service 30. OK, we made those up, but the following are all actual quotes, selected to reflect the breadth of responses.

OVERALL: Attendees exult! The conference was “out of sight,” “intellectually and artistically invigorating” and “inspiring,” even “one of the best in recent memory,” “outstanding” and “a real pleasure in every way.” One former conference chair declares Passage “The smoothest that I have ever attended;” other respondents cry “Truly, it was the most wonderful time” and “For a national conference of anything, I can’t think of how or why this shouldn’t go in the record books as an excellent event.”

Most first-time conference-goers report they “enjoyed it immensely,” saying “My first year at SPE was a great experience,” but one grad student reports “Overall, I felt pretty ‘blah’ about the conference.” Still, longtime SPEites are thrilled with the renewed vigor of the organization, going so far as to say “I can’t think of anything negative.” One writes “I have been going to SPE Nationals off and on since what I think was the first one in 1964... [I was] inspired, informed and entertained.”

ATTENDEES: The swarm also reviews itself with pleasure, a high school teacher declaring “I was pleased to see the number of high school educators present” and a grad student happy to see “a growing student culture...where some of the energy comes from,” adding “I love the access to the speaker after the talk.” Others find the high energy and crammed programming to be a bit much, saying “As usual, very dense. Rush, rush, rush. Hello. Goodbye.”

Conference attendees, as Willie Williams on the right, filled hotel hallways to look at portfolios

A woman who joined SPE in 1970 (when there were about fifty members and only two women) has found recent years’ meetings “daunting,” adding that “changes in the world and organization are nearly overwhelming.... mostly this year’s convention felt like networking madness to me.” Still, the prevailing sentiment is that SPE is “so much healthier than in the past,” with an air of “positive change.” Adds one educator “A spirit of camaraderie has returned and the younger generation are embracing the organization again,” affirmed by a museum professional who says “I disagree strongly with what I heard from some quarters about too much programming for students.” Participants were pleased to meet some “kindred spirits” and overjoyed to be reunited with “old friends... who had not been to conferences in years.” Still, one observer reports that the swarm is missing something, saying “It never ceases to amaze me how white the organization is.”

HOTEL: “The Hilton was excellent” and “hospitable,” assert most respondents, who add “The meeting rooms and exhibit hall were just the right fit” especially “all the seating areas for informal discussions and gatherings.” Not everyone agreed; to some, “the layout made things seem more disjointed rather than cohesive” because it was “too spread out.” The large presentation room seating 600 was too small for the Kenna, Klett and Connor talks; a weary latecomer gripes “The standing room only for long presentations was a real pain.” A familiar SPE party doll cites “poor access to the hotel bar” and a graduate student speaks for many when he cries, “Please, for the love of God, can you start picking cheaper locations??”

CITY: No discouraging words heard here at all. “Portland was a lovely place to be with everyone,” say those who ventured out, praising the choice of location as “superb — Portland is not only a delightful city but one that is very appreciative of the arts.” “Cheap and easy public transportation was refreshing!” cries one member, while a regular conference-goer declares, “Great city, like the last four SPE Nationals.”

MAJOR SPEAKERS: Inviting a keynote speaker from outside of photography is heralded a “GOOD MOVE!” and “bold” by respondents. Renowned essayist, short-story writer and international traveler Barry Lopez, who spoke in the “acoustically perfect” Newmark Theatre downtown on Thursday night, was “a breath of fresh air” and “a superb speaker,” say pleased SPEers, as well as “humble and insightful” delivering “by far the best and most literate” keynote address in recent memory. One educator declares “wonderful keynote (maybe gazing beyond our photo navel would expand our place in the world),” while a student writes “His injunctions to pay attention to diversity, creativity and social action were a great message for us to hear—as students and as potential educators.” Some respondents remain perplexed by Lopez’s sudden abandonment of his own photography many years ago, but perhaps that should remain mysterious. (The keynote address is now available on DVD to conference attendees and SPE members.)

Featured Speaker Mark Klett presented a talk called “Ideas About Time,” showing several “impressive” interactive and digitally layered projects including Third View. Speaking to a standing-room-only crowd in the hotel Friday night, he was “great which is exactly what I expected,” says a fan. “It brought tears to my eyes,” admits another. Says another, “Mark Klett’s talk would have been more appropriate for a big ending on Saturday night.”

Photographer and neo-Portlander Michael Kenna spoke to another packed crowd earlier in the day, showing pictures from his thirty-year fine art career. He drew many appreciative comments from respondents. “He was funnier than I expected,” says one. “The best presentation of the conference,” raves another. “Kenna prints quite small,” noted one writer, so it was “pretty cool” to see his landscape images blown up “so huge on the screen.”

Honored Educator Linda Connor’s Friday afternoon talk (and images with music), entitled “There Are Times When More is More,” also drew warm accolades. Former students and fans state “she truly deserves the honor” and “it was wonderful to see her amazing work again.” A student writes “I thought she did a brilliant job equating photography with other art forms. I found her talk conceptually stimulating and inspiring to an aspiring teacher.”

After her popular Adobe workshop, conference attendees crowd to ask Julieanne Kost more questions about Photoshop

DAY PROGRAMMING: “The hardest part was trying to schedule” which of the 19 imagemaker talks, 13 lectures, 6 graduate student presentations and 7 panels to attend, say our feedbackers, observing “the bar is higher than it used to be, which is encouraging.” One divided loyalist appreciated “the digital programming; I missed some of it to go to other things that feed the soul...” Others touted the panel “To Publish or Be Published,” “the portraits of half-Asians,” “the Edgerton presentation,” “John Stamets from University of Washington with his mammoth construction records,” “Byron Wolfe’s ‘Everyday: A Poetic Diary with Pictures,’ which may have saved my artistic life,” and “Roger Sayre, perhaps because [he isn’t] solely a photographer.” Also singled out by our correspondents was the “New Workflow” panel “that carried further good discussions [from] the Columbus regional conference concerning the shift from analog to digital” and “the Harlem of the West” panel and the one by David Bate about Stieglitz’s The Steerage and many others. Logistics seemed to flow remarkably smoothly, despite “the volunteers not knowing how to use the slide projectors,” and even though it took one panel “45 minutes to get through all the introductions.” A few speakers were dissed for “looking down at notes way too much, and not speaking into the microphone,” but most everyone applauded the choices, appreciating “the mix of experienced teachers/photographers with young imagemakers.”

ACADEMIC PRACTICUM WORKSHOPS (APW): The brand-new academic and pedagogical tracks (see Practicum summary) were “a great addition,” say several correspondents, who are “pleased with Thursday’s offerings” as a “vital” and “needed” move. Participants in these seminars were “astounded” at their popularity, and one respondent reports that “many people were excited about the curriculum database [for the SPE website] that was being discussed.” Both workshops were “extremely valuable” to a member who is a single photographer in a small art department, who explains “it’s often difficult to get mentoring help, or answers to questions about tenure.” Keep Thursday as the pedagogy day, say some, “instead of infiltrating the Friday and Saturday times.” All in all, the Thursday programming was seen as a successful effort to “put the E back into SPE.”

PORTFOLIO REVIEWS: The portfolio reviews continue to draw both kudos and critiques, ranging from “I think the portfolio reviews are stellar,” and “an excellent opportunity for all” to remarks from numerous folks who were “very disappointed about not getting a single portfolio review.” A portfolio reviewer notes “Despite the great number of us on the list, it seemed there were still not enough to meet the demand;” this year the reviewer pool suffered from “numerous no shows.” “Get more reviewers!” cried several respondents. Nevertheless the reviewers and reviewees alike find the program “very helpful” and “very well organized thanks to Nate Larson and Robin Assner.”

The Exhibits Fair drew over fifty vendors from across the country to show their wares and answer questions about new technology

EXHIBITS FAIR: With a smaller ballroom space than last year, SPE packed ’em in again with 43 vendors in booths, 7 sponsors in larger booths, 18 publisher/workshop/vendor tables, and six group publisher tables. Attendees found the trade show “useful” and “helpful,” commenting “It was nice to talk to people from the actual companies that make the products we use every day; also to find out about other products...” Educators Fair: Ten schools participated in the launch of SPE’s new Educators Fair, which featured schools with accredited undergraduate and graduate programs in photography and related media at colleges and universities. The response from attendees and exhibitors to this addition was positive.

RAFFLE & AUCTION: The print raffle and auction raised over $13,000 for student scholarships, thanks to donations from luminaries like Linda Connor, William Wegman and Terri Warpinski, and scores of beautiful books and useful equipment. No news is good news, we guess, as no one griped about any aspect of this event except one respondent who moaned, “As we’re all inherently complainers, I’ll start with that and get it over with: I wanted the Phil Harris piece or the Joyce Tenneson. OK, that’s it for the down side.”

GALLERY SELF-TOUR: After years of horrid bus experiences and loud complaints, the Portland organizers went bus-free at last. So naturally the bus tour was “the thing that I missed most,” say a couple of “disappointed” attendees, adding “the shows on Saturday night were some of the best in recent memory but to get to them all with some time to look became impossible.” Many of the intrepid made it to galleries anyway, lauding “all of the coordination in town with the many galleries who were featuring photography—a superb effort.” One person wondered about local participation, observing “No reception at the Portland Art Museum seemed strange.”

PARTY: As usual, the instant photo studio at the Saturday Night Dance Party, expertly managed by Polaroid and Mamiya, was hugely popular, as was Bob Edgerton’s display of interactive optical devices. “The live band [Funkopolis] provided a great finale” though one student would prefer “a DJ—who doesn’t talk.”

Conference Planner Ashley Peel Pinkham and Program Chair Phil Harris announce raffle winners as Raffle Coordinator Carlos Diaz stands by to assist

CONGRATULATIONS: to the ten recipients of the SPE Student Scholarship Awards, Alison Carey, Sarah Caylor, Marie Griffin, Scott Hilton, Allyson Klutenkamper, Emily Momohara, Adrienne Pao, Robert Rainey, Dawn Roe and Damon Sauer; and to the recipient of Freestyle Crystal Apple Award, Joy Christiansen and her teacher at Texas Woman’s University, Susan kae Grant.

THANKS: Kudos and thanks to all who worked hard on this conference, including the 150+ student volunteers without whom SPE couldn’t pull off Conference One.

Thanks to all our exhibitors, and especially to our major sponsors: Adobe, Calumet, Eastman Kodak, Fuji, Freestyle, Hasselblad, Mamiya, and the University of Oregon. Special thanks also to the ASMP Foundation, The Oregon Community Fund, Nazraeli Press and Polaroid for support through grants and donations.

Much gratitude and many accolades to the brilliant staff trio consisting of Corporate Sponsor Coordinator Jeannie Pearce, Newsletter and Website Editor Hannah Frieser, and Advertising Coordinator Mary Brown, who are tapering off their professional involvement with SPE, but not, we pray, their personal and artistic involvement. And finally, we offer SPE’s gratitude to you all, well-expressed by one of our respondents who writes: “I would also like to extend my thanks to the many people who made themselves available on a casual basis and allowed themselves to be poked and prodded with questions pertaining to their professional expertise. This kind of generosity is what makes these conferences worthwhile.”

CARRY ON: Next year, the 43rd National Conference takes place in Chicago, Illinois, March 23-26, 2006. The theme is A New Pluralism: Photography’s Future and the deadline for proposals is June 1. “I can’t wait till next year,” exclaim newbies and veterans alike, who are “already looking forward to next year’s conference.” One teacher says he will bring “as many students of mine as I can.” I hope the city has big shoulders.

Sandy Sorlien
National Board Member

2005 Conference Review, a summary by the SPE Executive Director
Academic Practicum Workshops, a summary by Liz Lee
Barry Lopez keynote address, available to conference attendees on dvd
Special thanks to conference planners, speakers, sponsors and more

photographs courtesy of Ryan Flathau and Harris Fogel