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Outside the National Constitution Center, Photo by J. Smith for GPTMC

Whoever said social media is doing more harm than good to today’s students hasn’t seen the recent exhibit at the National Constitution Center.

We the People: Afghanistan, America and the Minority Imprint features photographs taken by students from Philadelphia’s Constitution High School and Marefat High School in Kabul, Afghanistan. The students collaborated over websites like Skype and Shutterfly to share photographs with each other, discuss their subject matters, and talk about the similarities and differences between their respective cultures.

The resulting exhibit, tucked away in Posterity Hall between Signers’ Hall (with all the bronze statues) and NCC’s main exhibition space, is an impressive but unassuming collection of 30 or so photo pairings with an interactive console at the center of the space. Each pairing includes one photo from a Philadelphia student below a photo from a student in Kabul. It’s the juxtaposition of these photos that really gives the exhibit its power. A photograph titled Tank Playground of children climbing on armored vehicles half-submerged in sand on a beach outside of Kabul takes on a new meaning when paired with Day at the Beach — a tranquil photo of an Ocean City, N.J. lifeguard boat in the surf.

And for the most part, the exhibit feels intentionally sparse, allowing visitors to draw their own connections between these photos from Philadelphia and Kabul. While some, like the beach scenes mentioned above, have a direct thematic similarity, other comparisons are more abstract, sharing only a prominent color or shape within the two photographs.

While the subtle interpretations make for a more engaging exhibit, at times the lack of context threatens to reduce the impact of the project, taking away from what the kids learned and how they went about taking the photos and choosing which ones would be included in the exhibit. That’s where the interactive console comes in. There, visitors can scroll through an additional 150 photos from Afghan students and choose between three American photos to pair them with.

What’s more, you can read the captions students wrote for each picture. This is, by far, the most underutilized part of the exhibit — and a part definitely worth checking out. The student captions are insightful and often really funny. While one student laments that his photography is “instinctual” rather than “accidental,” another comments that she just wishes her mom would let her die her hair pink. Your best bet: Take a look at all the pairings and draw your own conclusions and interpretations from them, but then sit down to read as many of the captions as you can.

Yes, the exhibit’s a great idea for mutually beneficial collaboration between the two groups of students. But it really stands out for the quality of the photographs across the board — from composition to color to subject matter. This isn’t the kind of exhibit where the work is impressive, “especially for high school kids.” It’s simply impressive — just be sure to read the captions, too.

Being “We the People”: Afghanistan, America and the Minority Imprint @ The NCC
May 14 – September 26, 2010

National Constitution Center
525 Arch Street, Philadelphia, PA 19106
(215) 409-6700
www.constitutioncenter.org