Started in 2015, the goal of The Wise Photo Project is to create photographs—portraits of seniors—that otherwise would not be made and therefore wouldn’t exist. I have photographs of my grandparents and great-grandparents in my home which is only possible because someone made them and printed them, framed them and kept them all these years.
These portraits are often made on black and white film (occasionally color) and then hand-printed in my darkroom. Some I photograph with digital cameras and printed digitally. These formal legacy portraits are created for people I don’t know and many I will never meet—the great-grandchildren and other family members of future generations. I make the selection and a framed portrait is then gifted to them. These are the celebrities of our families and deserve to be photographed in a formal way as much as society’s celebrities. Since its inception, I have photographed hundreds of these ‘senior celebrities’.
In 2020, the project invited photographers throughout the world to join in with the goal of increasing the number of portraits made, created by professional photographers documenting their family and friends’ parents, grandparents and great-grandparents. There are now other photographers in the project making Wise portraits including Jeff Botts in Kentucky and Mark Smith in Colorado.