Lillian Gerrity – Lilly to everyone on campus who knows her. 

She is a junior global studies major, minoring in photocommunications. 

Her affable yet unassuming personality makes her one of the most approachable people on campus. 

Lilly ignores any pretense of the “cool kid” stereotype and is often the first one to initiate conversation with everyone and anyone, thus making her one of the coolest kids on campus.

She’s passionate about her photography and that’s what drives the rest of her education. 

“I’ve been studying photography for a couple of years, I didn’t know that I liked it until I went to Europe with my family,” Lilly said.

 “I started just shooting pictures of bridges and architecture, but then I also started taking photos of, like, a cigarette butt on the ground next to a flower, just because I’m in this crazy surreal beautiful place,“ Lilly said. “At the same time, it’s reality, and people smoke here. I like it when surreal is balanced out with something that just grounds you.”

When asked about her future, she makes it clear that photography will be the centerpiece of it, while everything else will work to influence an artistic style that seems to insist on finding a new perspective to reality.

Photography helped Lilly to meet people, and she uses her peers on campus as well to inspire her.

 “It’s really fun for me to sort of pop up and talk to people. That was one of my first projects in Photo I: we were given an assignment where we had to take 50 images of a person or a place. When I got here, I was so crazy shy. Then I got this assignment, and I decided I was going to face my fear and just talk to everyone,” Lilly said. 

When talking about the city of Austin as an influence, Lilly appreciates “how a lot of people from Austin are individualistic but unassuming. Yeah it’s nice to be noticed, but it’s not their primary focus – their primary focus is finding out what they’re doing with their life and then doing it. They’re so quiet about their talents, and so I like getting the chance to take a photo and bring that out about them, because they won’t do that for themselves.”

Currently, Lilly does freelance photography and also interns and shoots for Kathy Dunn Hamrick Dance Company. 

If it occurs to you, approach her – assuming she doesn’t beat you to it.