Daydream Nation

Opening reception Thu., June 10, 6-9 p.m., free, through Aug. 21, Philadelphia Photo Arts Center, 1400 N. American St., Suite 103, 215-232-5678, philaphotoarts.org.

by John Vettese

For its inaugural Contemporary Photography Competition, Kensington's Philadelphia Photo Arts Center borrows an album title from Sonic Youth and a mood from the Gerhard Richter painting adorning its cover. Images in "Daydream Nation" skew minimal, mysterious and evocative. Daniel Shea frames the gridlike panes of a large studio window, the twin smokestacks of some anonymous factory towering over a harbor just beyond the frosted glass. We see a black-clad pair of women amid autumn leaves in a piece by Samantha Contis, but it's not clear whether they're lying in idyll or exhaustion. And George Awde's singular, nervous portrait of a man exhaling cigarette smoke in front of a Santa Claus decoration is as unsettling now as when it appeared in the 2009 Yale M.F.A. exhibition at Gallery 339.