TITLE: In Their Dorm

“In Their Dorms,” a photographic portfolio, looks at college students in the personal space of their dormitory rooms during the restrictions of COVID-19. Over a period of 10 months, I walked around Stockton University’s Atlantic City dormitory, where I am also a resident, to photograph students on a weekly basis.

I used a self-imposed limit of five photographs per room, using medium format Ilford Delta 400 black and white film. I wanted to capture two different locations in each dormitory suite on one roll of 10 negatives. Working with a limited number of images, forced me to be more careful with the person or people I was photographing. My influences include the photo book “Animals” by Sage Sohier and the photographic series “In my Room” by Adrienne Salinger. These projects represent the rooms of coming-of-age teens in the 1990’s and adults in the late 1970’s with their companion animals. In my exhibition, I am presenting photographs in three phases of working with the students, first a picture at the doorway entrance, an interior room view, and a close portrait. I want people to take in the faces of these college students and the uniform spaces they occupy. Some of them decorated their spaces to feel more comfortable and make themselves at home during the extra time we must stay in the dorm with the restrictions of COVID-19.

It was not important to me to get the person's life story or tell me too much of their personal life but to take their picture to create a representation to show they were here.

AUTHOR: Dominique Terteweh (United States)

Dominique Terteweh is an artist from New Jersey who focuses in film photography.