Photos by Mount Saint Mary College Professor Christopher Neyen were published in F-Stop photography magazine’s August 2022 issue.
Neyen is an associate professor of Art and Graphic Design, as well as the director of the Communication, Art, and Digital Media program at the Mount.
The images, taken from Neyen’s series “Project Monograph,” are portraits of two college students: Christopher Lane ’22 of Newburgh, N.Y., who was a Business Management and Administration major with a Graphic Design minor at the Mount; and Long Island University Global student Haley Hiemstra. The photos can be seen here: www.fstopmagazine.com/groupexhibition.html
Neyen’s “Project Monograph” focuses on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on college students.
“Being in higher education, I had a front row seat witnessing the emotive experience of my college age students, along with their friends and contemporaries,” he explained. “These young people who are arguably at the most socially active time of their lives were unknowingly thrust into an almost science fiction-like scenario, having a sequestered purgatory imposed upon them. Forced separation, cancellation of pivotal school and community events, and general isolation.”
He added, “The portraits attempt to bring forth and expose what COVID has stolen from a generation: the vibrant world of wonder that this stage of life declares.”
In addition to his work at the Mount as a professor, Neyen is also coordinator of the college’s CMA Gallery, which exhibits professional art and media picked by Mount faculty from among the rising population of artists who live and work in Newburgh, Beacon, and throughout the Hudson Valley.