Mary Shannon Johnstone is Assistant Professor of Art, Meredith College in Raleigh NC. She holds an MFA in photography from Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT), and a BFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC). Shannon has had solo exhibitions in Chicago, Rochester, and Raleigh, and won several awards in group exhibitions across the country, including three Best in Competition awards in the North Carolina Annual Photographer's Exhibition (2002, 2004,2005), and an Honorable Mention in the 2004-2005 Houston Center for Photography Fellowships. Most recently Algonquin Books has selected one of her photographs as the cover image for a novel by North Carolina novelist Michael Parker.