Meg O’Neill is a recent graduate of Sewanee: The University of the South. She received her Bachelors Degree in Art with a focus in photography. Throughout her studies, Meg became fascinated with photography’s ability to convey experience, connecting people. Meg has been the first to receive The Robert Bowden Shepard Jr. Award for photography two years in a row, as well as The Robert Bowden Award in the Spring of 2013.

Along with studying photography, Meg minored in International and Global Studies with a focus on Global Capitalism in Latin America and the Caribbean. In the winter of 2010, Meg traveled to Trench Town, Jamaica where her interests in human perception of territory began. This interest was further explored during her travels in the winter of 2011 to Cuba, where Meg produced photographs that reflect a comprehensive portrait of place as a reflection of the self. Her photographs draw connections between Caribbean and American experiences, through the shared human experiences. Experiences such as violation, helplessness, self-revulsion, repulsion, and aggression, as experiences that are personal, not only influence the way we perceive place, but they actually define it in very specific ways, specific enough to be considered as embodiments. Meg conveys the impression of these experiences of perception of place through the movement of the body in relation to the horizon line, which provides disorientation to the viewer in order to convey feelings of a wounded hope that is struggling to move beyond the barriers of experience. Meg’s photographs attempt at resolving the separation between violation of self and place as seen as a reflection of body.

Meg is currently working as a sales associate for Quality Camera Company in Atlanta. While continuing her photographic exploration of themes that connect people of different race, gender, and background together. After a few years of expanding her photographic work, Meg plans to return to academia to complete a masters in documentary studies in hopes of using photography to explore the world and expand others perceptions on issues of equality and human rights.