Riverside Place, a Vanderhoof non-profit seniors complex, got a spirit-lifting boost recently thanks to a change of scenery provided by the Nechako Valley Photography Club.
Anne Davidson visits her 96-year-old mother, Hilda Villumsen, most day in the seniors complex.
Davidson is a member of the photography club and she and four other members wanted to learn how to do black and white photography.
"When I would visit with my mom, I noticed the pictures on the wall are sepia images from centuries ago," said Davidson. "So residents are looking at these itty bitty pictures and they can't see them."
So the five club members who were interested in taking portraits went to Riverside Place at Easter and took photos of the residents in their Sunday best.
"And then we put the portraits on the wall and they are fantastic," said Davidson. "So that's the new welcoming wall."
Each portrait is about eight by ten inches in size.
After residents saw how cheerful the welcoming wall was, they asked the photography club if they could put more pictures up on the walls.
"So I gathered pictures from the photography club that could be enlarged," said Davidson. The sizes vary but most are 39 by 27 inches. Davidson wanted to please the residents by ensuring the focal point was one subject, so that from any distance and no matter whose eyes were looking, they could enjoy the photograph.
"So there's one deer in the picture, one moose in the picture, one cow - so that anybody can tell what it is," said Davidson. "So then after we came up with this really grandiose idea, it occurred to us that we had to come up with a way to finance this thing."
Jerry Petersen, director of Area F for the Regional District of Bulkley Nechako, awarded the photography initiative $2,000 from the grant-in-aid funding allotted by the government for community projects.
Davidson wanted the project to be a locally created effort so she called upon small business owners Earl and Margaret Giesbrecht from Sew Rite Designs to have the prints enlarged.
"As photographers we all have thousands of pictures on our computers but who are you going to show them to?" asked Davidson. "Most of us don't want to display them publicly but we just want someone to really enjoy them, so what a perfect spot."
Riverside Place has always been a friendly place but now when Davidson goes into the seniors complex she is often asked where the photos are hidden. Davidson not only displayed the photos in common areas but up and down the hallways and behind doors. It's resulted in an increase in mobility for a lot of the residents, she said. They go off to explore and more often than not, as Davidson visits her mother every day, she will overhear lively discussion about the sawmill in the picture or what kind of classic truck, flower, or bird is in the photo.
