Both Sides of the Table
Photography Portfolio Reviews Do’s and Don’ts seminar
Both Sides of the Table: Photography Portfolio Reviews Do’s and Don’ts focuses on the fine points of photography portfolio reviews. A comprehensive guide was created by seasoned professionals for other seasoned professionals and those new to the portfolio-review process. CENTER award recipients Debe Arlook and Eric T. Kunsman interviewed forty-four contributors representing a diverse selection of reviewers, reviewees, and organizers, offering readers a full range of experiences from and for those on both sides of the table.
DAY 1: The presenters will offer advice and personal stories about online and in-person portfolio-reviews.
DAY 2: Participants receive an individual portfolio review.
WHEN • Wednesday, September 3, 2025, 6:00-7:30pm EASTERN TIME
Add-on Individual Portfolio Reviews available on September 4
WHERE • Hosted online through Zoom
HOW • Pre-registration is required - see below
PURCHASE THE BOOK • $19.99 - published by RIT Press
Registration
The seminar is provided free of charge to current CENTER Members. Please click on the “members” button below or email programs@centersantafe.org for access to the free members registration link.
Seminar • $0 Member // $25 Non-Member
CAN’T AFFORD THE REGISTRATION FEE? • Registration Fee Waivers are available on a case-by-case basis. To apply, you must fill out our Registration Fee Waiver Request Form before the Fee Waiver deadline of August 27, 2025.
CANCELLATION • You may cancel minus a $35 processing fee until August 27, 2025. Please be aware that there is a minimum number of registered participants needed in order to run the class. Should that minimum not be reached, we will cancel the class and refund your registration fees.
RECORDING • The seminar will be recorded and shared with registrants and members post-program.
Add-On Review Session • $85 Member // $95 Non-Member
Debe Arlook is an award-winning Los Angeles–based artist crossing the boundaries of conceptual and documentary photography. Originally from New Jersey, she attended American University in Washington, DC, and graduated with degrees in film and media arts and psychology, which inform her photographic practice.
Inspired by her dedication to personal growth and spiritual practices, Arlook’s projects express the porous boundaries between human and mystical experiences. She blends multiple photographic styles using landscape, conceptual, and documentary photography to communicate these observations.
Arlook is the recipient of the 2024 Working Assumptions Grant and the Klompching 2024 People’s Choice Award. She is a FRESH 2024 Finalist, Critical Mass TOP 200 Finalist 2024, 2021; FOCUS Photo L.A. Finalist 2023, 2019; Critical Mass Top 50 Finalist 2022; CENTER Social Award Honorable Mention, 2022; and LensCulture Summer Open Finalist 2022. Her work is widely published and exhibited in museums and galleries in solo and group exhibitions in the US and Europe and in numerous private collections.
Eric T. Kunsman was born and raised in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. While in high school, he was heavily influenced by the death of the steel industry and its place in American history. Exposure to the work of Walker Evans during this time hooked Eric into photography. Eric had the privilege of studying under Lou Draper, who became Eric’s most formative mentor. He credits Lou with influencing his approach as an educator, photographer, and contributing human being.
Eric holds his MFA in book arts/printmaking from University of the Arts in Philadelphia and holds an MS in electronic publishing/graphic arts media, a BS in biomedical photography, and a BFA in fine art photography, all from Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, New York.
He is a photographer and book artist now based out of Rochester. Eric works at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) as an assistant professor in the Visual Communications Studies Department at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf (NTID) and is an adjunct professor for RIT’s School of Photographic Arts and Sciences.