Unshuttered

Photography Lessons Designed to Inspire Creativity and Promote Social Good

Getty Unshuttered is a platform and community for teens to share their passion for photography and social justice advocacy. Unshuttered provides arts integration resources for high school teachers and students including lessons, activities and related materials to explore the medium of photography and its social impact in your classroom. Photographs convey potent messages. They entice. They draw us in. They communicate ideas that resonate across time, place, and context.

Lessons are organized into three series, which can be used as an entire unit of study or as individual lessons. They explore topics in visual arts, English language arts, social studies, and more.

We invite you to use the Unshuttered lessons in your classrooms. Each lesson webpage and related worksheets can be shared directly with your students. Download the accompanying Educator Resource PDF for more in-depth suggestions on facilitation, answers to discussion questions, and assessment resources.

Social Justice Advocacy and Photography

Photography has often been used to bring awareness to social justice issues and to inspire action. Today we live in a world in which more people than ever create and consume images. Photography may be our most powerful means to inspire positive change. These lessons include explorations of self-identity, community, and service.

Visual Narrative and Photography

With visual narratives, a story can be conveyed through a single image or a series of images. They not only reflect but can shape our daily experiences, our thoughts, and even our values. They can present information, demand our attention, and construct our realities. Discover the types and purposes of visual narratives, and the tools to effectively construct your own. This five-lesson series focuses on the art of storytelling through photography.

Foundational Photography Skills

No matter what type of camera you have, this five-lesson series explores basic photography skills. From composition to light to perspective, learn the principles of the medium to inform how to “read” others’ photographs and to hone your creative practice.