‘The Way I Saw It’: Pat Little’s Sports Photography Heads To All-Sports Museum

Photographer Pat Little can have his personal exhibition open within the Penn State All-Sports Museum, titled “The Way I Saw It.” The exhibit will characteristic his sports activities images work, with photographs relationship again to 1977. 

Penn State alumnus and Centre County native Pat Little has labored for quite a few publications, together with the Centre Daily Times, Philadelphia Journal, and the Associated Press. He first started taking images in 1977 and labored for the Daily Collegian. After graduating from Penn State in 1977, he attended Ohio University and earned his grasp’s diploma in photojournalism in 1991. 

His preliminary curiosity in sports activities images was sparked after taking his first job in Philadelphia for a start-up sports activities newspaper. Little’s boss served as a mentor to him, and when he returned to State College a 12 months later, he was ready to make use of the abilities he was taught. 

“I happened to walk into it, and then I happened to meet the best sports photographer I ever would meet. And he was my boss, and I worked with him for a year, and he basically gave me a master class in sports photography,” Little mentioned.

The preliminary planning for the exhibition started within the spring of 2024, with Little collaborating alongside the museum to pick out a variety of photographs that may be displayed within the exhibition. The scope of the exhibit will embody his photographs from 1977 to 2005, and it’ll characteristic photographs that seize the varied elements of sporting occasions, together with athletes, crowds, and venues. 

“It was done to create a feeling or a memory or something about that era that will touch you in some way,” Little mentioned. 

Little shared that he needed to kind via hundreds of negatives to pick out photographs for the exhibition. He feels that though the method of sorting via photographs has been intensive, he has discovered satisfaction in rediscovering forgotten photographs relationship again to 1977.

The museum gave Little round eight months to kind via his negatives, and he returned with 5,000 picture choices. He emphasised the significance of preserving an organized log of negatives and taking good care of them to keep up their high quality.

“Probably one biggest key to everything I’ve ever done was I always took care of my negatives. I always made sure they were processed properly, and everything was on,” Little mentioned.

The characteristic picture for the exhibition is Little’s most well-known picture, displaying a Nittany Lion with a child Nittany Lion sitting on high of his head. He recollects capturing this picture solely weeks after first selecting up a digital camera. 

Before the exhibition is finalized, the museum continues to be awaiting the arrival of bodily objects that will probably be included. For additional updates on the exhibition’s opening, you may go to the All-Sports Museum’s website.