From Staff Reports
Like every year, another crop of young hopeful students will be embarking out into the world from the University of Central Florida to put their new skills to the test in the applied trade they set out for.
The exhibition, titled “Fourward,” will be from 5 to 7 p.m. Saturday, May 2, in the renovated Ivanhoe Warehouse in the trendy Mills/50 area of Downtown Orlando, 1300 Brookhaven Drive. As the name implies, four featured artists comprise the pop-up exhibition: Alicia April Adams, Hannah Gloglower, John Hilton and Pedro Lopez.
The four are enrolled in UCF-Daytona State Campus Professor Laine Wyatt’s Museum Gallery and Practices Course as part of their senior year in the BS Photography program. It requires that they create their own gallery show including finding a venue, raising the funds needed in creating the entire show such as refreshments, promotional materials, framing and matting and generating a general buzz about the show before May 2.
“The show goes back to the second year of the program in 2001,” said Wyatt. “It’s experiential. It gives them a truer sense of what goes on in the real world, when they have to produce it from scratch. These days, they’ve been using the crowd-sourcing fundraising sites and utilizing their work as incentives to donate. Last year, the past president of WMFE, the National Public Radio station, donated and received a print from one of the students.
“They have met their goal every year and produced shows that have been discussed long after the event. They do produce their own catalog which is a living memento of the exhibition.”
They are currently using the crowd-sourcing site Indiegogo to help raise $2,000. At press time, they had collected $1,410 toward the goal. On the website they detail what the funding goes towards and rewards for those who contribute. Among the donor perks are official “Fourward” beverage koozies and an 11×14 signed photo print autographed by one of the photographers.
“Fourward,” explained Lopez, “is a play on words since there are only four of us in the show, as well as noting our transition from ‘student’ photographers to being seen solely as just a photographer.
They hope the gallery will show their transformation from learning students to fully trained photographers for all to see. For more information, go to:
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/fourward-a-ucf-graduation-photography-exhibition. — Andre Long contributed to this story