Only at RIT: What’s Up in William Harris Gallery
Previously known as SPAS Gallery, the William Harris Gallery was renamed for its benefactor, William Harris, a 1968 BS alumni, who gifted funds to support the Gallery and its renovation in 2013. The Gallery has long been a space for display for the photographic arts and sciences, and, in recent years, has opened up its doors to other disciplines in the College. It hosts both internal and external-organized exhibitions, supporting the mission of excellence of the School and College.
With renovation, the School was able to expand the ability of the Gallery to present installations and video in more meaningful ways. Case in point the annual exhibition Short Attention Span Film Festival, which illuminates how time-based moving media is a cornerstone or a touchstone of curriculum. Organized by faculty in the Photo School, this exhibition invites current students from across the University to share short time-based moving media in a variety of formats: GIFs, boomerangs, motion graphics, cinemagraphs, animations, and video clips. A panel of jurors from multiple Schools in the College of Art and Design survey student submissions and select prize winners.
The idea for the Short Attention Span Film Festival stems from our ever-evolving digital culture with always-connected social media begging for our constant attention. Short content for a shortened human attention span—in 2015 reported to be just eight seconds—has sparked attention-getting visuals that can be an end in itself or as a visual hook leading to long-form content. Whatever the case, the rise of short-form content with its multitude of short-form media formats has become an additional tool for visual creators, marketers, journalists and promoters to trigger immediate interest, emotion, and reaction.
The William Harris Gallery is committed to presenting how RIT students are contributing to the shaping of photographic and imaging media via a convergence of technology and cultural aims. It offers an academic year of exhibitions and allied events that supports the educational mission of the School of Photographic Arts and Sciences and the College of Art and Design.
The Short Attention Span Film Festival is on display in the Harris Gallery from Monday, November 4 through Friday, November 8, 2019.
The William Harris Gallery is directed by Therese Mulligan and is overseen by a gallery manager and a staff of MFA students, many of whom go on to work in galleries and museums after graduate school. To learn more about the Gallery and upcoming exhibition and events, please visit artdesign.rit.edu.
About the Author
Therese Mulligan, PhD, is a Professor and Director of the School of Photographic Arts and Sciences at Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, NY. She also directs the School’s William Harris Gallery. A curator and photographic historian, she has authored and edited articles and publications on historical and contemporary photography. Mulligan was the curator of collections at the George Eastman Museum before joining RIT in 2005.
