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Past SPE Annual Conferences

Southwest Chapter

SPE Southwest Chapter includes:
Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah

Chair Ariel Wilson
Vice Chair/Secretary Julia Martin
Treasurer Daniel George
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Southwest chapter on facebook

Message from the Chair

The Southwest and West Chapters are currently accepting calls for both presentation proposals and artwork to exhibit during their joint conference on October 18th and 19th at Weber State University in Ogden, UT.

Submit Presentation Proposals here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSej5O2B64uO5L3nuVAMncduT2ADFpuOgCfyPIXZkOhzcQPwaw/viewform

Submit to Call for Artwork here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSejqC1xpFO0rc2OltY-VgYVWkiL97Sm98NkqRPgHEEQZyVYWg/viewform

Submissions will be considered through 7/30.


Southwest Chapter: Updates

Join us to hear photo students and recent alumni present about their work, how they are exploring certain themes, and more about their practice. Each event will feature 3-5 invited presenters. We are looking for more schools and individuals in the West and Southwest regions who would like to participate. 

More details: https://linktr.ee/SPEWSW

Sept. 8th, Sacramento State recent alumni will present work with the theme of nostalgia. Elisa Fernandez, Will Kraintz, Frances Kenney, Megan Sinclair, Molly Berg, Ricardo Cazares, moderated by Andrew Dumitru. 

Oct. 3rd, California Baptist University students: Raymond Alva, Alicia Berardelli, Ashley Chruszcz, and David Fouts will present.

Nov. 3rd, Brigham Young University

Dec. 1st, Utah State 

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Elena (@thinstring) and Nate (@natelarsonphoto) are excited to co-chair a panel for the 2027 SPE Conference (@spenational) in Minneapolis. 

The call for participation went live today - if your work/practice/ethos are a match, perhaps you’ll share with us for possible inclusion? 

Submission information here: https://www.spenational.org/2027sessionlist 

Beyond Documentary: Reimaging Expanded Practices
Co-Chairs: Nate Larson (@natelarsonphoto) & Elena Volkova (@thinstring) 

This panel will consider photography as a collaborative, process-driven practice that can foster resilience within communities shaped by trauma. Expanding documentary modes, strategies to be discussed will emphasize participation, co-authorship, and ethical accountability, positioning image-makers in a continuing and expanding partnership with their subjects to promote belonging, create space for agency, self-representation, and shared narrative control.

Central questions include analysis of power: who controls representation, how images circulate, and what responsibilities do practitioners have to/for/with communities with whom they engage? We will also explore how participants actively shape the conditions of their own visibility, while negotiating and redirecting the gaze to challenge histories of marginalization and imposed ways of seeing. The panel will also explore the nature of long-term and ongoing engagements: how do relationships form and change over time and how does this shift the work itself? How can social practice and engagement support dignity and community resilience over expanded timeframes?

We invite panel submissions from photographers, social-practice artists, and artist collaboratives that work in socially and community engaged, and/or expanded documentary practices and are willing to share critical moments, vulnerabilities, and successes within their work.

10 days ago via Instagram

Elena (@thinstring) and Nate (@natelarsonphoto) are excited to co-chair a panel for the 2027 SPE Conference (@spenational) in Minneapolis. The call for participation went live today - if your work/practice/ethos are a match, perhaps you’ll share with us for possible inclusion? Submission information here: https://www.spenational.org/2027sessionlist Beyond Documentary: Reimaging Expanded Practices Co-Chairs:...

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