Creators Challenge: Black & White
Here are some of our favorite submissions from our third “Creators Challenge,” which challenged creators to create wherever they may be NOW, and to seek out inspiration wherever they could during this isolating time in the world. The theme was “Black & White”
Seasonal Suffocation
By: Michael Chadrjian
New York weather has been bipolar. While the sun is out and shining, the winds and temperature have yet to align. Thus, leaving us as close to relaxing outside as possible. I think these pictures provide an accurate representation of my feelings in regards to the weather here throughout the day.
Michael Chadrjian
Three
By: Justin Chen
How many reflections does it take when he’s no longer you?
Justin Chen
My Journey Within
By: Brooke Giamo
I've never really known who I was inside. There was so much inner turmoil that I was repressing emotions that needed to be felt. I wrote a poem before quarantine, but I've never really followed my own words. This pandemic has given me the opportunity to truly discover myself and unlock that love within. I am eternally grateful.
When we face a new stimuli
Our minds like to assume
It's a threat
But if we keep an open mind
We see, things unknown to us
Are not the enemy
When we stay calm
In the face of, what we don't know
We teach ourselves
To have confidence in our abilities
To understand the things
We perceive as unknowable
Until we have learned
There is nothing we can't know
When we have faith
in ourselves
But if that faith gets lost
We remember, that bump in the road
Is there to reinforce us
Of our abilities
Put there for us to overcome
So that we can have
Strength and gratitude
For ourselves,
Or any other obstacles
We may face
By reflecting on
Our own journeys
We discover the uniqueness
Of each of our paths
And we come to learn
That having a different path
Does not mean
It is better or worse
That instead,
It is yours
To love
Brooke Giamo
Up All Night/ Morning Light/ Kinda Thing
By: Megan Montgomery
Well, as you may have guessed by the title, I had been up all night. At this point I was probably in a state of delirium. You know that place you straddle when creativity meets delirium? I just looked up at the wall and suddenly I was excited. I was excited by the shadows. I've always had a thing for shadows. I was excited by the light. Again, something I totally dig. I was even more excited by the reflection of both. I just let my eye follow the light as it bounced from window to wall to glass picture frame and down. And when I had turned around about 180 degrees, I saw my shadowed body all right there, on this little patch of light, almost at the floor. I just grabbed by phone and started taking a portrait series, quickly documenting where it started but also where it had landed. And in that moment I found joy and a bit of myself, alive and in the moment. It was that kinda thing.
Megan Montgomery
IT’S ALL A BLUR
By: Larissa Raquel
For those who don’t know- May is Mental Health Awareness Month. If someone you know is struggling with Mental Health related issues, please be there for them. Let them know you care. If you are the one struggling, be kind to yourself. We’re gonna be okay, we’re in this together. The uncertainty of our current time is almost debilitating for some people. Not knowing what the future holds, feeling as though you have no strength, or control- is such a horrible feeling. I created these via FaceTime on one of my darkest days of self isolation, and every bit of this day just felt like a blur.
Larissa Raquel
