The Advanced Photography Students of Sacred Heart Preparatory in Atherton, California are pleased to announce:

An Exhibition of Photographs from the U.S. / Mexico Border and Bay Area Immigrant Communities

Documented //

// Undocumented

On View May 16th - June 8th

at Spur Projects in Portola Valley

Opening Wednesday, May 16th, 2007

Reception 7:00pm // Artists' Talk 8:00pm

Presenting eighty hand-printed black and white photographs by Rebecca Abbe, Molly Dickinson, Marie Hamilton, Shannon Hamilton, Pallavi Menon, Anna Paustenbach and Greg Randall on display from Tuesday through Saturday, 11:00am to 6:00pm and by appointment at SPUR Projects, 888 Portola Road in Portola Valley, California.

For further information contact the gallery at 650.529-2040 or teacher / organizer Lars Howlett at lhowlett@shschools.org

Additional details and images will be posted soon at Web Link

This announcement is also posted with photos in the SHP news section : Web Link

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Seven advanced photography students from Sacred Heart Preparatory in Atherton, California have been exploring the issues of immigration and cultural identity through the lenses of their cameras. Working on film and in black and white, the high school students have been documenting community events, rallies and daily life in the Mexican and Central American immigrant communities of the Bay Area including Fair Oaks and San Rafael. In March five students traveled to Tijuana to spend five days at the Casa del Migrante, a Catholic refuge that provides meals and beds each night for up to 150 migrants and deportees. Students shared dinner with the migrants, hearing first-hand accounts of the harsh realities of life on either side of the border. Along with making portraits of the men, the photographers also explored the communities along the wall, documenting the daily joys and hardships in neighborhoods under the shadow of the United States.

On May 16th the students will present eighty hand-printed black and white photographs in an exhibition premiering at SPUR Projects in Portola Valley. Students will be showing the work at various venues over the course of the next four months including at school, on the Peninsula, in San Francisco and within the local Mexican-American community. A website and book presenting further images from this group project is also being planned and further support is needed.

This marks the second public exhibition for photographers Rebecca Abbe, Pallavi Menon, Molly Dickinson, Marie Hamilton and Greg Randall whose winter show "The 5 Senses" held at the Bank of America in Menlo Park was well received by the public and in the local media. This is the first public showing by Anna Paustenbach and Shannon Hamilton. Shannon was also awarded first prize for youth in the Palo Alto Weekly photo competition held this year. Selected images from this series were also exhibited at the 2007 Forum on Day Laborers held by the Cesar Chavez Institute at San Francisco State University.

The teacher and organizer of the project is Lars Howlett, a visual artist based in San Francisco and part-time photography instructor at Sacred Heart Preparatory. He can be reached at lhowlett@shschools.org for more information and/or high quality jpegs of the images for use in publication. The project and exhibition(s) are made possible by Sacred Heart Preparatory with the support of the Office of Service Learning and SPUR Projects who will host the initial showing from May 16 through June 8th.