As part of a collaborative initiative between Emily Carr University of Art + Design (ECU) and Hopehill Society, I participated in an intergenerational portrait project that paired third-year photography students with residents of one of Vancouver's oldest senior living communities. This newly developed project is part of Pathways for Creative Futures, supported by the BHER and the Government of Canada, promoting shared learning and creative expression, fostering dialogue between youth and seniors.

This series focuses on Roohie. Over eight weeks and multiple encounters, our relationship, shaped through the lens of the camera, evolved. The work outpaces simple documentation. It reverberates her identity past headshots: her honesty, her perspectives, her memories, her country, her car collection, her Star Trek shrine. This collaboration means entering a mutually vulnerable trust. For Roohie, it meant navigating the intimidation of the camera, sometimes within her intimate, everyday space, to be shown and seen. For me, this took the shape of an added quiet responsibility for her image and gratefulness for what made it possible.

This enriching experience concluded with the joint exhibition Threads of Time: Photographic Connections, which displayed portraits as an interplay of stories, ideas, and images. The artists activate the camera’s capacity to compress time, while conversations brought seniors’ histories into the present, and their rich life stories inspired the students’ visions for the future. These encounters reveal how photography can preserve and reinterpret life’s narratives, offering profound insights into how lives are lived and could be lived.