From the medical lab to the photo studio, Sharlie Brown ’05 is exceptional.

Her main career is as a human tissue compatibility specialist at Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist, helping ensure cell and tissue transplants are successful. Most patients don’t know this: She took top prize in this year’s Smithsonian Magazine Photo Contest.

Her photograph, “Woman Sitting Under the American Flag,” shows model Seriana Gamble on the stairs of a historic home in Old Salem. Above her, the stripes of the American flag wave.

Actually, Brown and her collaborators were there to work on “The Hair Project,” spearheaded by creative director Erica Garrett-Ray. Its goal was to “bring attention to the beauty of Black women and our hair,” says Brown.

As they walked the historic avenues, though, Brown was struck by one spot. She said, “Wait, we have to stop here!” Directing her assistant and model, Brown captured a glorious work of art.

Brown is winning awards today, but when she began, she just wanted to celebrate her own growing family. “I started having kids, and I needed to take pictures of my baby.”

She was following in her mother’s footsteps. “My first camera was a Pentax, and that was because my mother did photography when she had me, and she had her old camera and all those lenses.”

Brown credits her collaborators for the success of “Woman Sitting Under the American Flag.” She says valuing others is a spirit she carries from her student days. “What did I take from my UNCG experience? Community. Knowing people and collaborating with people.”

By Mercer Bufter ’11 MA