“There’s nothing as inclusive as high-school football in Texas. All our differences vanish when we walk into the stadium.” – Joe Nick Patoski, exhibit curator
SEPT. 10
JULY 1, 2010 Bill Kennedy, professor of Photocommunications, develops a course for Fall 2010 in which students will photograph Texas high-school football and possibly have their work included in an exhibit about Texas high-school football at The Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum. Kennedy has joined forces with Joe Nick Patoski, author and former staff writer at Texas Monthly and keen authority on all things Texan, who has signed on to guest curate the exhibit.
JULY 18 Briley Dockery ’13, a former editor of the yearbook at Tascosa High School in Amarillo, learns of the upperlevel course and asks Kennedy for entrance, despite being a sophomore. If there’s ever a course that appears tailor-made for a student, this is it. Dockery cut her teeth on sports photography when she began shooting high-school football at Tascosa and became hooked on the energy of the Friday night games. “I loved how the whole week at school would lead up to that one game,” she says. “And once you’re there, it’s just the rowdiest crowd of your life.” To Dockery’s delight, Kennedy grants her entrance to the course.
20 ST. EDWARD’S UNIVERSITY
Kinnison shoots her first game at her alma mater, John B. Connally High School. Though she’s nervous, she learns to get over her fear of putting a camera in someone’s face. She soon finds she’s drawn to small-town football. “It doesn’t have the flash, and it’s simpler,” she says. As she drives through small towns, she discovers that seemingly everyone in town is at the game, and that every radio station broadcasts the game. “It’s kind of like a being in a ghost town [during a game],” she adds.
JULY 22 Rebecca Kinnison ’11, a former band member at John B. Connally High School in Austin, sees posters promoting the course. Her lack of knowledge of sports photography gives her pause, and she reaches out to Kennedy for advice. Kennedy encourages her to use her inexperience as a way to capture the moments in sports rarely seen by “looking where no one else is looking” and “shooting until you can’t shoot anymore.” Determined to find success in the midst of unfamiliar surroundings, Kinnison enrolls.
SEPT. 2 Fall semester kicks off on the hilltop, and the eight students enrolled in the course meet with Patoski and the Bullock curatorial staff to discuss the project. Their challenge is laid in front of them like a sprawling football field: Successfully capture the social phenomenon that is Texas high-school football. A year later, they could be gazing at their photos hanging in one of the state’s premier museums.