SELF PORTRAIT

A juried student photography exhibition from UDC

Curated by Professor Iwan Bagus

January 28th - February 21st, 2026

In the quiet spaces where light meets shadow, where the self is both the artist and the subject, a unique narrative unfolds. This exhibition is a testament to the myriad ways we perceive and project our own existence. It transcends the superficial boundaries of race, gender, and age, inviting viewers into the private worlds of the artists. These images, captured through the lenses of a diverse group of UDC students, challenge us to look beyond conventional definitions of identity. From stark, unvarnished honesty to ethereal, reimagined realities, the portraits reflect a spectrum of experiences and emotions. This is not about perfect faces or staged lives; it is about the raw, unfiltered essence of being human. It is an exploration of what it means to be seen, to be heard, and to define oneself in a world of predefined labels.

TOPAZ TERRY

This photograph looks at the small, private routines that come with being a woman at fifty, and the work of keeping up my appearance. In the image, I’m caught in one of those moments that’s both ordinary and a little absurd: plucking a chin hair, wrapped in a towel, half-covered, half-exposed. It’s about sharing myself with honesty in a culture that still asks women to hide the effort.

KENNETH WEBSTER

This work was born from a year I could not otherwise articulate. As someone who is often a pillar within my family—emotionally, spiritually, and financially—I learned early on how to hold space for others while quietly setting my own weight aside. In 2025, that weight became unavoidable. The year was marked by loss: close family members passed, and stability dissolved as I became one of many affected by mass job layoffs imposed across the country. Grief and uncertainty arrived simultaneously, leaving little room to pause, reflect, or recover. There were moments when the only private release I could find was retreating into a closet to scream—sometimes silently, sometimes not.

This piece is not an attempt to beautify pain, nor to resolve it. It is a record of endurance, fragmentation, and emotional overflow. It reflects the tension between being relied upon and being depleted; between showing strength and feeling undone. Unable to express these experiences through words alone, this work became the vessel for emotions I had been carrying without permission to fully feel.

Untitled (“Self Portrait”), 2026 is not a likeness of my physical form, but of my internal state—a portrait shaped by grief, responsibility, survival, and the quiet act of continuing forward.

NORA GALIL

At sixty-two, I re-enact Modigliani’s Portrait of Maude Abrantes using my own face, makeup, and costume to examine ageing and projection. Abrantes’ detailed eyes suggest a complex inner life, unlike Modigliani’s later vacant gazes that signal distance or introspection. Her heavy makeup and prematurely aged appearance—often linked to addiction—mirror how age is read onto faces. By inhabiting her image, I question how time, myth, and perception construct maturity.

CHRISTIAN CAMPBELL-CARRIGG

For my entire life, I have been surrounded by the flag. As a military child, every morning reveille was played and the flag was raised, and every evening retreat was played and the flag was brought down. The American flag means something different for everyone. For some, it is no more than a political statement or just a flag. For others, it is a symbol of loss and the understanding that someone is never forgotten. My hope is that people will understand the American flag is not just a flag, but also a symbol for those who have served and a reminder to never forget those who were lost.

MELISSA ADEYEYE

This self-portrait reveals what is often concealed beneath baggy clothing and masculine presentation. Through paint and body, I allow myself to be seen-- open, unlayered and unfinished. Paint functions as evidence of creation and the presence of life, leaving marks of movement, emotion, and release. I believe we are the curators of our own lives, and this work is an act of exposing the hidden and honoring the courage it takes to be visible. Art exists everywhere, as long as we take the time to look.

CONNOR TRACY

This work is built around a familiar loop: effort, progress, and the sudden return to where I started. Food becomes a stand-in for comfort that turns controlling, something I reach for even when I know the cost. The setting is intentionally unstable, a place where “holding it together” is always temporary, and relapse feels less like a decision than a pull. I wanted this image to sit in that uncomfortable middle ground where shame and relief exist at the same time, where reward and punishment start to look identical. Instead of offering a lesson or a victory, this scene holds the repetition: the climb, the slip, the aftermath, and the knowledge that tomorrow asks for the climb again.

AMARACHI CHIKEREUBA

This image came from a feeling more than an idea. The setting a rough, unfinished space with cracked walls and harsh lighting felt like the right place to explore something personal. The blue light gave it a cold, quiet mood that reminded me of moments I can’t fully return to but still feel. I wanted to capture how that kind of space holds emotion, how it can make you confront yourself. It’s about memory, mood, and the process of finding who I am in a place that feels both empty and familiar.

SAVANNAH AGUILAR

At sixty-two, I re-enact Modigliani’s Portrait of Maude Abrantes using my own face, makeup, and costume to examine ageing and projection. Abrantes’ detailed eyes suggest a complex inner life, unlike Modigliani’s later vacant gazes that signal distance or introspection. Her heavy makeup and prematurely aged appearance—often linked to addiction—mirror how age is read onto faces. By inhabiting her image, I question how time, myth, and perception construct maturity.

JOHN WILDEMAN

This photograph sits at the nexus of aging, maintenance, and the work of keeping a body legible. It touches on masculinity and femininity not as choices, but as habits learned early and carried forward. I am aware of the distance between my body and interior life, and of society’s insistence on closing that gap.  How I move, present, and am received was shaped before I had language for it. This image holds the realization that identity arrives preloaded; race, gender, and authority is assigned, reinforced, and mistaken for selfhood. I ask what a man is, and what was ever mine to decide.

MARINA MOURA

Inspired by the fate of Ophelia, this work reflects on vulnerability, surrender, and the quiet poetry of disappearance. Suspended between silence and breath, the image captures a moment where resistance fades, and the body yields to emotional weight. Like Ophelia adrift in the water, the figure exists in a space between presence and absence.

Rendered in black and white, the lack of color emphasizes stillness and emotional depth, allowing the body to function as both subject and symbol. Water becomes a threshold for release, mourning, and transformation. Rather than portraying struggle, the image lingers in softness, echoing the tragic grace with which Ophelia meets her end, surrounded by beauty even as she fades.

This work invites reflection on fragility not as weakness, but as an intimate state of being. It considers how silence, loss, and surrender carry their own form of power, and how beauty often emerges when control is gently relinquished.

JUSTIN WIGGINS

This work looks at the tension between desire and consequence, and the pull of things that seem valuable but don’t last. It reflects a mindset of internal struggle, where chasing small rewards can take over, even when we know the cost. The burning money is a symbol of impermanence, temptation, and the choices we make when we want something. The piece invites reflection on how we reach for what we want and how our idea of value shapes our actions and how we see ourselves.