Since 2007, Richard Renaldi has been working on a series of photographs that involves pairs of strangers interacting with each other while posing for their portrait. Working on the street with a large format camera, Renaldi meets his subjects in towns and cities all over the United States. He pairs them up and invites them to pose together in ways that people usually reserve for their loved ones and close friends. Renaldi creates spontaneous and fleeting relationships between strangers for the camera, often pushing his subjects beyond their comfort levels. The resulting photographs are moving and provocative, and raise profound questions about the possibilities for positive human connection in a diverse society.

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This exhibition is held in partnership with Loyola's School of Social Work, celebrating its 100th anniversary.

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Organized by Aperture Foundation, New York. Curator: Ann Pallesen, Gallery Director, Photographic Center Northwest, Seattle. The traveling exhibition Touching Strangers was made possible, in part, with the support of the Robert Mapplethorpe foundation.

Image: Shalom and Jeff, 2013, Brooklyn, NY, from Touching Strangers (Aperture, May 2014). © Richard Renaldi.