On Rose: Photo Contest and Bay Area Gallery Exhibition
On Rose invites photographers to create thoughtful, visually compelling work inspired by Rose: as a flower, color, symbol, place, memory, or moment of renewal.
A physical rose does not need to appear, but the connection should be visible and meaningful within the photograph.
Selected photographs will be exhibited at Abrams Claghorn Gallery this October.
Entries close August 31, 2026 at 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time.
Selected Photographs Will Be Exhibited This October
Looking Glass has partnered with Abrams Claghorn Gallery on Solano Avenue to present selected On Rose photographs in October 2026. An opening celebration is planned and will be hosted at the gallery. Exhibition dates and opening details will be announced soon. Learn More About Abrams Claghorn Gallery
How to Enter the Contest
One entry purchase covers one entrant and up to three photographs.
1. Purchase Your Entry: Choose the sliding-scale entry amount that feels right for you.
Every amount provides the same contest access and has no effect on judging, selection, exhibition consideration, or awards.
2. Submit Your Photographs:
After checkout, use the Looking Glass Order # and Zealous link, the platform used to collect contest submissions, in your On Rose confirmation email to submit up to three photographs before August 31, 2026 at 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time. Each photograph must be submitted separately and assigned to one contest category. You may submit all three photographs to the same category or divide them among different categories. (Important: Image submission does not occur at the time of purchase. Photographs are submitted separately through Zealous. Immediately after purchasing your entry, you will receive an On Rose confirmation email containing your Looking Glass Order # and a direct link to the On Rose submission page on Zealous. Your contest entry is complete after your photographs have been submitted through Zealous.)
The Contest Categories
- The Botanical Rose: Rose as a natural subject. Form, texture, growth, decay, fragility, abstraction, and the hidden worlds within a bloom.
- Symbol, Story, and Metaphor: Rose as love, beauty, secrecy, longing, resistance, resilience, remembrance, hope, transformation, contradiction, or connection.
- Rose as Color: Rose, pink, blush, coral, magenta, red, or rose gold used as atmosphere, emotion, tension, identity, or story.
- Celebration, Honor, and Community: Images of care, gratitude, remembrance, legacy, gathering, joy, and communal connection that visibly relate to Rose.
- On Rose Street: A literal or imaginative interpretation of Looking Glass’s new Rose Street home, including place, neighborhood, belonging, transition, and shared stories.
- They Rose Up: Photographs about resisting, returning, rebuilding, or becoming. This category invites images of courage, defiance, renewal, movement, resilience, and transformation. Moments when people, places, communities, or ideas rise from pressure, loss, injustice, silence, or change.
What Does Rose Mean to You?
Does a rose need to appear in the photograph? No. The connection may come through subject, color, symbolism, story, place, emotion, or idea.
Awards and Judges
The overall winner, category winners, and honorable mentions will be exhibited at Abrams Claghorn Gallery & Shop in October. The overall winner will also receive a commemorative trophy recognizing the photograph selected as the strongest work in the contest.
Entries will be reviewed anonymously by Bay Area photographers Becky Jaffe, Sarah Deragon, and Brandon Ruffin. Photographs will be considered for their interpretation of Rose, visual voice, emotional resonance, and photographic execution.
Sarah Deragon
Sarah Deragon is an award-winning Bay Area portrait photographer, educator, and founder of Portraits To The People. For more than fourteen years, she has created authentic portraits for entrepreneurs, executives, artists, and organizations including Google, Meta, Adobe, and Visa. An educator and speaker, Sarah teaches photography and AI workshops throughout the Bay Area and serves on Adobe's AI Advisory Council. Her personal work explores identity, queer community, and the power of helping people feel truly seen through photography.
Becky Jaffe
A photographer and educator, Becky Jaffe exhibits her photography in over fifty galleries and museums nationwide, serves as a judge for the Northern California Council of Camera Clubs, and teaches photography internationally for Cal Discoveries Travel. Her photographs have been published in LensWork, SHOTS Magazine, Der Greif, the San Francisco Chronicle, Rattle Magazine, Bay Nature, and The Sun. She remembers the moment she bought her first film camera from Looking Glass 35 years ago, like being handed a passport. She sees the On Rose exhibit as a chance to celebrate Looking Glass, which is still the beating heart of our thriving East Bay photography community.
Brandon Ruffin
Brandon Ruffin is an Oakland based, multidisciplinary artist, best known for his visual storytelling in the mediums of photography and film under the moniker Ruff Draft. Brandon attributes his style of storytelling to the exploration of identity, as well as how identity influences the movements and cultures of people within society. In 2025 Brandon released his debut monograph, “Migration Patterns,” with Setanta Books, which made Smithsonian Magazine’s top 10 photobooks of 2025 list. He is an official Leica USA Ambassador, a contributor to publications such as Rolling Stone, Sports Illustrated, The New York Times, and the San Francisco Chronicle, and a founding member of OAKSPC.
Eligibility and Photographic Integrity
Photographs may be made with film, digital cameras, phones, or other camera-equipped devices, but every submission must originate from a real-world photograph made by the entrant.
Limited AI-assisted editing may be permitted when disclosed. Fully generated, prompt-generated, or substantially fabricated images are not eligible.
Older photographs are welcome, provided they are the entrant’s original work and comply with the Official Rules.
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