Laurel Smith of Carbondale recently returned from Jeffersonville, New York, where she attended the international Eddie Adams Workshop, an intense, four-day gathering of top photography professionals. Admission to the workshop is extremely competitive and limited to 100 (50 students and 50 emerging photographers), who attend tuition-free.
Smith is two classes away from graduating from Colorado Mountain College’s professional photography program at the Isaacson School of Communication, Arts and Media. She said she wants to work as a photojournalist and is most interested in documenting social justice issues. She is the fourth student from CMC’s professional photography program to gain admission to the prestigious workshop since students began applying in 2016.
Eddie Adams was a photojournalist whose most well-known, Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph was the execution of a Viet Cong lieutenant on a Saigon street in 1968. One of the most published photographers in the U.S., Adams enjoyed a career that spanned journalism, corporate, editorial, fashion, entertainment and advertising photography, as well as covering 13 wars.
He started the workshop in 1988, to provide professional opportunities to photojournalism students based on their skills – and not on their ability to pay tuition. Adams died in 2004 at age 71.
Final group presentations can be seen at Eddie Adams Workshop 2019 – including Team Orange’s “Costume,” presented by Smith’s team. Her photo essay is called “Sophie,” and starts 5:28 into the group presentation.