Jenny Weil remembers her dad trying to get a picture of her and her friend as they revolved on a Ferris wheel. Each time he thought he had the shot, they moved onward and upward. She says she doesn’t know if he ever got the shot, but like him, she is an avid photographer.
Though Easton is near her Southport home, Weil admits to knowing little about it when she first entered the Easton Arts Council Photography Contest in 2016. Pleased to receive “Honorable Mention” for her photograph, “Snowfall in the Andes,” she decided to try again.
The contest has two categories, Local, for photographs taken in Easton, and General, for photos taken anywhere else. In 2023, Weil challenged herself to shoot in her neighboring town. Before she started, she did some online research, looking for Easton landmarks that would be interesting subjects. She visited Union Cemetery and the Congregational Church before training her lens on the Grist Mill at Aspetuck.
“I didn’t realize I had driven by the little house by the Aspetuck many times, since it’s tucked behind trees,” says Weil. “I’ve seen many pictures of the mill, always with the waterfall in them. I decided to try something different.”
Her approach grabbed the attention of the 2023 contest judge, Alison Wachstein, a Weston resident who drives by the mill house frequently herself. “What fun!” Wachstein said of her First Place choice. “I was impressed by Weil’s…charming and unique vision…focusing on a few leaves and texture of the stonewall in the foreground. The building is softer, but still recognizable.”
On Oct. 21, Jenny and the Easton Arts Council presented the “Little House on the Aspetuck” photograph to First Selectman David Bindelglass. It will join other first prize winning photographs on permanent display in Easton Town Hall.
‘Bitten by the Photography Bug’
Her dad was that neighbor who invited you to see his slide show from their most recent family vacation. As a child, she was one of his subjects — sometimes a reluctant one —before she herself was bitten by the photography bug.
Now her own son, Alex, 13, claims that she doesn’t really experience the places they go because a good part of the time her face is behind the lens. “I guess it’s how I see the world,” says Jenny.
Weil grew up in New Rochelle, N.Y. and attended the University of Michigan, where she received a bachelor’s degree in anthropology and communication, before moving to New York City. There she worked as a television producer, a copy editor and a newspaper reporter, all while earning her master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University.
In 2009, she moved to Connecticut, where she enrolled in the School of Interior Design at Fairfield University. While working on her degree, she began volunteering at Family and Children’s Agency in Norwalk, working to help adopted children find their birth parents. As an adopted child herself, Weil finds her work deeply personal and meaningful. She has been the agency’s adoption search worker since 2016, a job she says she finds incredibly fulfilling.
As for photography, it’s always been part of her life. Not only was her father an avid hobby photographer, Weil recalls a trip to the Galápagos Islands when she was 15 as seminal. A team from National Geographic was there, documenting the diverse wildlife.
“I couldn’t think of anything cooler to do,” says Jenny, who thought then that she would pursue a career in photography. Though she never ended up becoming a professional, she loves taking pictures, especially when she travels. Depending on the subjects, she uses either her Olympus camera or her iPhone.
For details regarding the 2024 Easton Photography Contest in November, go to eastonartscouncil.org/upcomingevents.
