The girl holds the bird in her arms, cradling it close to her chest. She looks down at its curled claws and vacant eyes. It was too late for the little warbler. 

Her father stands beside her, waiting. He knows this feeling. Then, the familiar sound of the shutter click. 

Nolan Streitberger is an Albany-based photographer with an eye for capturing candid moments of the soul. Over the past decade, he has documented the experiences of his 13-year-old daughter, Haley, in her ordinary life as an only child. 

Their collaborative body of work, Long Summer Days, is a collection of black-and-white images challenging the stereotypes of girlhood through Haley’s day-to-day experiences. The duo is preparing for their show opening Friday, Aug. 30, at The Arts Center in Corvallis, carefully sorting through hundreds of images as a team. 

“I was showing her a photo that I think I want to put in there, and she’s absolutely against it,” said Streitberger. “And it’s cool. It’s nothing bad. She has this headband from Great Wolf Lodge, and she’s like, ‘I just don’t want my friends to think I’m a furry.’” 

Streitberger hadn’t originally planned on creating a series of photos with his daughter. In fact, there was a time when he had no interest in photography at all.

His photography journey began in high school with little enthusiasm. After being accepted into Oregon State University’s JumpstART program, a pre-college accelerated arts curriculum, he ranked painting and graphic design as his top choices of study. Photography was at the very bottom of his list. 

“I got graphic design and photography, and I was like, ‘Ah, well, I don’t even have a camera,’” he recalled. “So I borrowed my dad’s old Vivitar thing that you could probably find at Goodwill for like two-ninety-nine now and learned photography.”

He went on to study graphic design at Linn-Benton Community College, landing a job at Hewlett Packard in Corvallis after graduating. When Haley was about 2 years old, however, he could sense the layoffs coming. His wife found a job around the same time he was let go. 

Finding himself in the new position of stay-at-home dad with time on his hands, Streitberger needed a creative outlet. So he picked up photography once again. 

“My wife got me a camera, and I’d just take it with us when me and my daughter were out and about,” he said. “And then it just kind of ballooned from there. I had no expectations of becoming an artist. I was just taking pictures … and that’s how Long Summer Days was created.”

He captured the first photo in the series when Haley was 4 years old. Streitberger was testing a new film camera, focusing on a chair to hone in the settings. His daughter had been running around in the yard behind him when she decided to sit down in the chair right before he took the picture. He captured the final image in the very first click of the shutter. 

In the photo, Haley sits in the lawn chair, one leg bent and one hand against her face. She looks directly into the camera, reclining as if lost in deep thought. 

“You try to pose a 4-year-old to sit like that, it’s impossible,” he said. “She just did it.”

Rather than manipulating the scene, Streitberger keeps his eye open for authentic moments with soul. When he took up photography again after losing his job, he struggled to find this element. Something was missing. 

Trying to discover that critical ingredient, Streitberger put down his digital camera. He built his own dark room studio on the covered patio in his backyard. With film, he knew that he could capture that missing component of soul. 

It worked. 

“I know it in my gut when I take that picture before I even look on the back of the screen,” he explained. “I’m like, that’s it. That’s what I was looking for.”

Through the years, he’s experimented with different photography methods, alternating between film and digital. Long Summer Days incorporates a variety of techniques, ranging from digital images to those produced on darkroom paper and Ortho Litho film. 

As Streitberger began discovering how to capture images reaching into those deeper parts of the human psyche, the photos evolved beyond merely a documentation of Haley growing up. They became an outlet to express deeper meaning.   

Rather than depicting Haley through stereotypical expressions of girlhood such as tea parties, dresses, and flowers, Streitberger strived to capture the reality of growing up as a young girl. He wanted to challenge the unrealistic search results of the internet. 

“You don’t see images of girls covered in mud or bleeding from their mouth from losing teeth or things like that,” he said. “You’ll probably see boys running around covered in mud with squirt guns or whatever, but you’re probably not going to find too many images of girls doing that.”

Streitberger’s own childhood shares similarities with Haley’s. Both father and daughter were raised as only children. Haley has been raised in the same home he grew up in. Yet many of his memories carry darker themes and metaphors. 

“My mom was an alcoholic and suffered from mental illness, and she left when I was in the third grade. I didn’t see her for 25 years. And a lot of my childhood kind of plays into some of these photos,” Streitberger said. When he photographed Haley, “she was just out there playing. She was just out there swinging, whatever. But when I clicked that photo, it’s like, I know.”

In the photo On the Swings, Haley hangs over the edge of a swing on her stomach, hands dangling toward the ground. The swingset is empty, with no other children in sight. She is alone. 

Streitberger explained that his experiences bring an additional layer of narrative to the scene, influencing which images he selects for the final collection and the meaning he is able to pull from each photo.  

“I don’t even think it was something I would do in order to create the photo,” he said. “I think it’s so deep in me, I would see it after going through the images.”

As father and daughter created photos, Streitberger said the most bonding experience has simply been spending time together. The camera just tagged along so dad had something to do while Haley played. 

Haley’s interest in having her photo taken has fluctuated. At times she loved it, but as she’s grown older, Streitberger said, she’s been more reluctant. 

The future of Long Summer Days will depend on what the duo decides as a team; Streitberger said he never pressures his daughter to be photographed if she is not interested. Recently, however, Haley mentioned the idea of re-creating past photos.

“I think the interest might be coming back,” he said, “but I don’t want to jinx myself.”