Art show features Plainview students
Halley Nemeth left her comfort zone and ended up with a scary-good piece of photography in a juried art show.
The senior at Plainview-Old Bethpage John F. Kennedy High School had her piece, titled “Psychosis,” featured among other students’ work at the Huntington Arts Council’s “Nightmare on Main Street” Nov. 1. Fellow Plainview resident and high school student Mackenzie Venezia had her piece, “Heaven and Hell” featured in the show as well.
For her photograph, Nemeth took a friend out to a dilapidated and abandoned mansion in Plainview and set the scene for a creepy photo shoot.
“It reminded me of psychopathic hospital ward. I told her to look as psychotic as she possibly could and I took her photo,” Nemeth, whose friend Molly Higgins played the role of the photo’s creepy character. “I didn’t think it was that good, but I kept it anyway.”
About a year after she snapped the photo, the piece was picked up by the Huntington Arts Council placing Nemeth in the running a Best of Show prize.
“Besides eternal glory, winning $50 would be pretty cool,” she said. “But to win an art competition is one of my dreams. I picked up photography a few years ago and it would be cool if it actually went somewhere.”
Nemeth first developed a love for photography while watching a lot of America’s Top Model. She said fashion photography caught her eye at first and after getting into the digital realm, she fell in love with the practice.
As a senior in high school, Nemeth has her eyes set on college with her top choices being Tulane, Emerson and Brandeis. She is thinking about majoring in English, with a minor in photography.
“It’s a dream of mine to become Annie Lebowitz,” she said, adding she has a growing interest in photo journalism, as well. “Right now I see it as being a side hobby, but if I pursue it enough maybe it will turn into something more.”
