A photographer from Dunmore will be featured at the premiere First Friday art exhibit to be held at the new ScrantonShakes Space at the Marketplace at Steamtown on April 7. Liza Gillette, who specializes in nature photos, has been a photographer for the Scranton Shakespeare Festival for some years, and is honored to help them open their new home which was donated to the arts organization by the management at the mall.
A graduate of Holy Cross High School, Liza is married to Brian Lawall from Wapwallopen, and is the daughter of Nick and Audra Gillette, both from Dunmore.
Her family owns Dunmore Appliance. She is the oldest of three, and has two sisters, Brooke and Nicole, who both still live in Dunmore.
After graduating from Holy Cross, Liza studied photography at Marywood University and later opened her own business, Liza Gillette Photography, although that was not her original plan.
“I got into it because I did a Marywood internship with Julie Jordan, a wedding photographer in Clarks Summit,” Liza explains. “She hired me as a second shooter and eventually I learned enough from her to start my own business.”
It was actually Julie Jordan who mentioned to Liza that the Scranton Shakespeare Festival was looking for a photographer for their productions, and because she liked the organization’s mission of presenting free professional theater, she got involved.
One of her favorite ScrantonShakes assignments was documenting their 2021 season at the Scranton Iron Furnaces.
“I loved working outdoors that year, which I had also done when SSF did some plays outside the Royal Theater at the University of Scranton during a previous season,” she recalls. She also acted as a red carpet photographer during several of the group’s Tony Award watch parties at the Scranton Club.
Her specialty, however, is wildlife photography, something that grew out of her childhood growing up near Drinker Street by the old Anna Maria’s Restaurant. “My dad built a house in the woods in the Sport Hill section and we would play by the reservoir,” she remembers.
She also took inspiration from a disposable camera her mother her when she was very young. Liza loved seeing the world from a different perspective.
Even today, she is still learning. During the pandemic, photographer were hit especially hard, so she began to learn welding from her grandfather, Herb Capooci, also from Dunmore.
“Right now I am doing crazy sculptures such as a Road Runner from Looney Tunes,” she says. “But I also do things like crosses, roses from sheet metal, and pumpkins and boot racks out of horseshoes, which I do sell.”
Liza ‘s exhibit will open on Friday, April 7, from 5 to 8 p.m. at Shakes Space at the Marketplace at Steamtown.