Kevin Salemme: Professor, Photographer, World Traveler, and Much More

After multiple conversations with Kevin Salemme I learned so much about him, a short article would not do justice when covering Kevin. Instead, this will be a two part series. The first getting to know Kevin in general and the second getting into more detail of his career as an artist.

Part I

Kevin Salemme’s that guy known around campus for taking the best photos. He’s your go to guy for getting the photo from covering events on campus or even just a random photo shoot with roommates. 

Recently, Her Campus Merrimack worked with Salemme on a photo shoot to use for marketing purposes and as a team bonding experience. Per usual, the photographs came out amazing; Kevin and the Her Campus Merrimack team had a blast, but we got to thinking … how did he get his start?

I wondered this after randomly running into Kevin and having a lengthy conversation with him about everything from Her Campus to traveling, the Pellegrinaggio trip, and just life experience. 

Kevin’s such a world traveler and knows of all the best spots to go. One of the reason’s Kevin is so versed in travel is because his wife is Swiss, so traveling around Europe is part of life. Somehow Kevin meets that profile that is flagged by customs he admitted; he said during a family trip on a road that zig-zagged through France and Switzerland they’d get stopped and Kevin would be searched. It would cause a “bit of a delay on the European vacation,” Kevin joked. 

After finding out about his lengthy list of “been there, done that” I joked that he should have his own trip, “Kevin’s European Vacation.” Kevin said he’d need at least three weeks to get in all the places he likes the best. 

“Start in Iceland, bathe in the blue lagoon and eat some fresh fish, head over to Ireland to have some guinness and guinness stew with some chips, head over to Paris where we would have rabbit and bordeaux. And swing by Geneva, Switzerland for some cheese fondue.” The trip would be based around “traveling, photographing, eating, and drinking,” now that is a class I would do anything to get in. 

Kevin is one of the many chaperones going on the Pellegrinaggio, he’s been on the chaperone list of the last seven years and plans on continuing helping out Father Jim for years to come. [I’m one of those lucky student’s that gets to experience this trip this March] He mentioned he has a few places he wants to hit while in Italy with the Pellegrinaggio group in our free time, and with Kevin’s stories I am more than excited to see what he has in store.

Kirsten Dube raves about the Pelligrinaggio and her time in Italy, “Kevin really enriched my experience.” “There was a free night to do what we wanted, we all split up into groups with one of the chaperones; Kevin took a bunch of us out to dinner and we all really connected. It made the experience have a really good vibe. He didn’t think he was above you, he was at your level. It was a really hard core community sense.” 

Kevin’s all about the students, you can see through his interactions that he is a genuine person. If you didn’t know, he’s the advisor for Tau Kappa Epsilon, TKE, on campus. He was even made an honorary TKE! Kevin received the Key Leader Award from Nationals, which recognizes an active, committed advisor for the dedication to their chapter. Kevin has been helping TKE for a while, even before becoming an honorary; Kevin would help the historian with the slide show for Red Carnation Ball and just be there for the guys. 

Kevin’s not just a good asset to the chaperone team because of his easy going attitude and ability to connect to the students, his ability to speak French is helpful over seas when communicating with locals. He “would watch the animal channel to learn french” since it was helpful with the picture/word association, reading signs and looking up words was another helpful way for him to learn the language. Kevin mentioned every time he asked for a bottle of water they tried to cook him a fried egg! French is a language that “took years, trial and error,” for him to perfect, but now he’s a pro!

Kevin always has a story for everything, making him so interesting to get to know.  There’s so much to Kevin Salemme and I haven’t even touched on his photography career. If you aren’t already, you’ll be amazed at what Kevin has done with photography.