Photographic Conversations

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Community Collaborative Project, University of Denver

Creative Challenge Community Elementary School (C3)

Instructor: Jessie Paige Rowe 

The Photographic Conversation was an inclusive and intergenerational community engagement project between The University of Denver and Creativity Challenge Community (C3), an innovative elementary school in Denver. The DU student participants were enrolled in Introduction to Photography and Photography Workshop taught by Jessie Paige Rowe and the C3 students were 2nd graders taught by C3’s art teacher BJ Kittleson and 2nd grade teachers, JH Sava and Sara Fornberg.

Over a 2 week period, both groups of students discussed visual language as a system of communication using visual elements. Students investigated what a visual element in photography is and the power of the photographic image. Signs, symbols and the use of metaphor in the understanding and interpretation of photography is key to visual communication as well as intention, personal meaning, and history. Then, over a 2 week period, the students from both institutions engaged in a visual dialogue – a photographic call and response – with a partner from the other school. The two groups of students had a conversation with no words, just pictures. This collaborative project pushed both groups of students to further understand the power of visual communication – that we can communicate and connect with others without the use of spoken or written language – and that although our experiences and contexts may be quite different, we as people are all connected through the human condition. 

Click on the images below to enlarge them and see the students’ work.

  • Andrew Parish (C3) and Ally Johnson (DU)
  • Ben Toomey (C3) and Max Potter (DU)
  • Charlie Bel (C3) and Sean Burch (DU)


  • Connor McCelland (C3) and Sky Gould (DU) 


  • Elea Grant (C3) and Aidan Hackett (DU) 


  • Emery Vogel (C3), Jessie Paige Rowe and Cali Silva (DU) 


  • Eve Goldberg (C3) and Kari Langford (DU) 


  • Forrest Soden (C3) and Jessie Paige Rowe (DU) 

  • Franklin Astroth (C3) and Kaleigh Arciniega (DU) 


  • Gavin May (C3) and Sam Epstein (DU) 


  • Graeme Griffin (C3) and Carolyn Kemp (DU) 
  • Griffin Hemmert (C3) and Peter VoDU) 

  • Iris Hoffman-Morgan (C3) and Kaleigh Arciniega (DU) 

  • Isabel Gulick (C3) and Max Potter (DU) 


  • Isabella Green (C3) and Marie Negaard (DU) 


  • Jay Steinhauser (C3) and Peter Vo (DU) 


  • JoJo Janah (C3) and Sean Burch (DU) 

  • Johan Bennish (C3) and Jessie Paige Rowe (DU) 


  • Jonny Dickinson (C3) and Conor Chapman (DU) 


  • Lilly Tewmey (C3) and Emily Glynn (DU) 


  • Matthew Margold (C3) and Emma Goldstein (DU) 

  • Maya Conti (C3) and Danielle Barba (DU) 


  • Muri Wilkins (C3) and BJ Kittleson (C3) 
  • Olive Dolan (C3) and Sam Epstein (DU) 


  • Patrick Jepkes (C3) and Anthony Crosby (DU) 


  • Phoebe Rowe (C3) and Kari Langford (DU) 

  • Riley Glazer (C3) and Ally Johnson (C3) 


  • Sadie Jewell (C3) and Jessie Paige Rowe (DU) 


  • Sofia Romero (C3) and María Erives (DU) 

  • Sophia Galera (C3) and Sky Gould (DU) 

  • Story Ginsberg (C3) and Aidan Hackett (C3) 

  • Sydney Frackman (C3) and Emma Goldstein (DU) 


  • Tex Cowan (C3) and Lynnzee Brown (DU) 


  • Tristan Schenk (C3), Jessie Paige Rowe and Carolyn Kemp (DU) 


  • Zoe Ekedahl (C3) and María Erives (DU)