Paul Stanek at ICP Career Day

Last week, our photo editor Paul Stanek hopped a train to New York and rode up to Penn Station. Once there, he walked a few blocks over to the International Center of Photography to attend their ICP Career Day. Paul would be participating as a reviewer during the event, which is held annually as an opportunity for graduating students to meet and have their work reviewed by art buyers, photo editors and other photo industry professionals.

Paul started his ICP day with a tasty sandwich and gnocchi lunch with his fellow reviewers. He was able to chat and network with professionals from over 120 different organizations ranging from local galleries to The New York Times to GQ. The most common question asked of each other was, “What are you looking for today?” To that, Paul’s answer was simple, “Future Wonderful Machine photographers, of course!”

Paul reviews Yasutaka Kojima’s portfolio. Photo by Lavonne Hall

After lunch, the group began their reviews. Paul had 12 back-to-back reviews, 20 minutes each. The reviews flew by quickly, and Paul found himself enjoying his discussions with the graduates. He even had a fan—a photojournalist/music photographer Caro Patlis—who asked if Paul could squeeze in time to meet with her. He happily obliged, skipping his break, and found her work to be very engaging.

Caro Patlis’ leave behind

There were a lot of interesting portfolios in the bunch, such as Verena Smit‘s. Verena’s poetic nudes caught Paul’s eye. He also thought her leave behinds were well executed and that the image she selected was one of her most interesting.

Verena Smit’s leave behind

However, out of all the reviews, Paul found himself particularly drawn to the work of Ryan Field. Ryan’s currently telling the story of San Diego’s unique and innovative surfboard design history through a series of well executed portraits of the designers and still life shots of the boards on seamless backgrounds.

Ryan Field’s leave behinds

Once Paul had gone through all the portfolios, he said his goodbyes and headed to Blarney Rock for a couple of rounds of Guinness with our New York photographer Dennis Yermoshin. Dennis and Paul enjoyed some pints and some Irish fare while they discussed Dennis’ book My Fellow Americans. Once the sun had set and their glasses were empty, Paul once again bid adieu to Dennis and New York and rode the train back to Philly.

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