Sparwood Secondary student Vova Voronin is using photographs to capture the heart and essence of his community.
Voronin has launched a website called Beautiful Sparwood, where he compiles photographs of landscapes, wildlife, people and places that define the community. Browsing through the images, one can find pictures of majestic elk, brightly-coloured birds, misty mountains, and urban sights.
The grade 12 student moved to Sparwood a few years ago and he said the project has helped him integrate into the community and get to know his home a little better.
“I learned more about the community. It was very nice to work with different people, to know more people around town,” he said.
Voronin sourced the website pictures from a variety of local photographers in order to get diverse community representation. The picture submissions have inspired him to get out and explore Sparwood and discover places that were previously unknown to him.
“I want to extend my vision of the community, go around town and see more places that people are sending me. There’s so many beautiful places I haven’t seen yet,” he said.
Voronin said that when he moved to Sparwood, he searched the community up online and found the pictures didn’t do justice to the municipality, and weren’t as dynamic as they could be. This inspired him to start his project and compile photographs of Sparwood that would change the way it’s perceived in Google searches.
His vision dovetailed nicely with a school assignment that required students to take on a project that would help better the community, so it grew to be more than just a hobby.
Voronin’s teacher Stephen Larsen said his passion for the project is evident.
“He didn’t have any experience with any of the programs he was using. He didn’t have any connections around the community. He started from scratch and pulled off a major project,” Larsen said
Larsen has agreed to take ownership of the project after Voronin graduates, and work with the photography and media design students to continue contributing to the website.
The Chamber of Commerce has been sharing the link to Voronin’s website to help garner interest and source more photographs, and it will provide Sparwood Secondary School with funding to help grow the site.
Voronin and Larsen said they’ve got a lot of submissions, but what they’re currently missing is pictures of people and local sports.
“There’s a lot of happy people doing fun things around the community and it’s not currently represented in photographs online and even in the photographs that we’ve been getting so far,” said Larsen.
To submit a photo, e-mail beautifulsparwood@gmail.com
Follow the project online at www.beautifulsparwood.com or on Instagram @beautiful_sparwood.