A black and white photograph into an interior space. There's an old, decorative door that is ajar. A woman is laying on the ground, her upper body wrapped around the back of the door and hidden from view. Her left hand is visible and outstretched, casting a shadow on the door.

K. Kelly Wise was born in 1932 in New Castle, Indiana. He was mainly an English teacher who received an MA degree in Contemporary Literature from Columbia University, New York City, in 1959, and a BS degree in Creative Writing from Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, in 1955.

He maintained a diverse career while teaching, launching a career as an artist and photographer, writing about photography as a critic for The Boston Globe, and editing books on photography. As he was teaching, however, he felt that the faces he saw in academia were not diverse enough—so when he stepped down as dean of faculty in 1990, he founded and became the executive director of the Institute for Recruitment of Teachers (IRT) at Phillips Academy.

Some of his publications include: Still Points, 1975; Lotte lacobi, 1975; Private Realities, 1974. Anthology: The Photographer’s Choice, ed., 1975. Periodical: Creative Camera, Jan 1977.