Community, Photography

Blipfoto is much about journaling, commenting, and community. But some of our finest photographers don’t comment much (because their lives require so much time that commenting is over the top for them, or because English isn’t their first language, or some other reason)—and may not be well-known to this community. They don’t have as many views, comments, hearts, etc. as those of us whose photos are not always fabulous, but have time to comment on each other. 

One of our truly great photographers, in my opinion, is a man in Bruges who calls himself Lightchaser12. He worked for years in a care facility for old people. He now volunteers to care for old people. He has made a great many rare and engaging photographs of aging people, including himself, though he’s also a fine street photographer. I’ve been following him for years.

On June 29 this year he posted a photo that moved me so much that I felt I needed to have it in my house. It’s actually his extra from that day that I wanted, and he kindly sent me an electronic copy that I had printed on art paper and mounted on foam core so I could hang it right below my favorite from marknlizzie, now hanging above my piano. The two portraits pretty much sum up what life is all about—the energy of youth; the energy, light, and stillness of old age. They now hang next to a colored linoleum block print of the unborn (Walter Anderson) given to me by my son Seth, after he read a (now deleted) autobiography of mine that began, "I came from an egg."