2001 Barrington High School graduate and professional photographer Ruthie Hauge is getting some fun and unexpected publicity thanks to Chicago Blackhawk Patrick Sharp. The left wing photobombed a newly married couple getting pictures taken by Ruthie during their wedding reception at the Hawks game Friday.
Die-hard Hawks fans, Carrie and Rob Krolak of Chicago, had their first date at a Blackhawks game seven years ago. So they decided to make a Hawks game the setting for their wedding reception, with BHS graduate Ruthie Hauge as their photographer.
The newlyweds held their wedding reception in a United Center Super Suite during last Friday’s game against the Carolina Hurricanes. During the pre-game warmups, they went down to ice level to take some wedding photos. Just as Ruthie Hague was shooting the pictures, Patrick Sharp skated up to appear from behind the glass in the photo background before returning to join his teammates.
The bride and groom were so thrilled that Patrick Sharp made an appearance in their wedding pics, they shared Ruthie’s images with their friends on Twitter, tagging the Blackhawks and Eric & Kathy, popular 101.9 fm morning radio hosts. Eric & Kathy talked about the photos during an interview with Patrick Sharp earlier this week and the now-famous photobomb was also featured on the Chicago Blackhawks’ website.
Ruthie says preparation was the secret to capturing these priceless images. She spent almost seven years working as a staff photographer for Sun-Times Media before starting her own photography business and says she approaches each assignment with a photojournalism perspective.
“I want to document what’s happening in front of me so I call myself a ‘reactive photographer’ and I like to capture the chaos and reaction that can happen in the moment. So a big part of getting this shot with Patrick was just being prepared and knowing that anything could happen at any given moment. When I was shooting the pictures with the hockey players warming up behind them, I was exposing the photos in a way that you could see the players in the background.”
Ruthie, who earned 18 state and national photojournalism awards while working with Sun Times Media credits her teachers at Barrington High School for inspiring her to pursue her photography career.
After graduating from BHS, she attended Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design and earned her degree in Photography.
She says photography teachers, Kayla Mizanin and Jeffrey Dionesotes and art teachers Dave Engle and Blake Mueller were incredible mentors during her days at BHS.
“If it weren’t for their encouragement, I never would have gone into art, let alone photography. We have a stellar art program at Barrington High School and everyone that goes through the program is lucky to be part of it.”
Today, Ruthie Hauge Photography is based in Crystal Lake and specializes in journalistic wedding, portrait, event, news/sports, food and promotional photography. You’ll find more of Ruthie’s work at RuthieHauge.com and here are more of Ruthie’s images from the Krolak’s Blackhawks wedding.
