Since my last blog entry, I’ve given speeches about Alzheimer’s and caregiving in Montreal; Greenwich, CT.; Baltimore; San Francisco; Dublin; Berlin; Luxembourg and Paris. My photographs from I Still Do have  recently been on exhibition in Berlin and Paris and are currently in museum shows in San Diego (MoPA) and Daytona Beach, Florida (SMP.)  It’s clear to me that people around the world want to understand the personal stories behind the Alzheimer’s statistics—and art is a way for them to connect very personally and very viscerally with a disease that is often still hidden.   Seeing how people bond with Ed through my photographs of him, and by extension connect with others with AD, is something I find very rewarding and touching.  For me, photographing Ed has enabled me to give shape to something that’s shapeless and a voice to something that’s been silent.  It’s been a way for me to confront Alzheimer’s using the only weapons I have.

Ed, by being my model, my muse, my husband, my best friend—and, always, my cheerleader—has given me a very great gift.  He’s also touched thousands of people whom he’ll never know.

Since we’re in the season of Thanksgiving, I will add that Ed and I are doing well even though his Alzheimer’s has progressed. Our conversations are less complex and wide-ranging, but we still understand each other. We go for walks in the facility in which he resides or we sit in the sun holding hands.   Last week, Ed had forgotten who I am and that we’re married—what he told me, though, is that I’m his best friend.  That, and dinner with my family, make this a very good Thanksgiving.

Here’s a review of the show by Robert Cortlandt:

Next on to Fifty Crows in their new space (which personally I found rather dark) . They’re showing Judith Fox’s new work I Still Do. An exceptionally moving show of photographs about her husband as he struggles with Alzheimer’s. It is a very intimate and personal look. One thing about documentary photography, for me at least, is that struggle for access where I am reaching for the intimate. She seems to have achieved that fine line of revelation that doesn’t feel like intrusion. The feeling in her book is exactly what I want to achieve in my doc. projects.  

I’m attaching a few photographs from the trip and from the show.  I also want to share with you a photograph I took at the lovely Yerba Buena Park on the one day it didn’t rain.

I’m attaching a photograph from my book and photography series I Still Do; I hope you enjoy it.