Deborah - Wreck Beach - taken with a swivel lens panoramic Widelux

April - Wreck Beach circa 1977 - my first nude

Because my mother, grandmother, wife Rosemary and I were teachers I have a feeling that I am obliged to impart the knowledge in my head before I meet up with my statistically  soon oblivion.

Katheryn at the Marble Arch Hotel

I may have the largest files on women not wearing much anywhere. I would like to explain why this is so.

Until I was around 14 I was a painter and drawer. My mother even had me take lessons in Mexico City with an artist called Robin Bond. One day I told my mother that I could no longer draw or paint. She became very angry and almost gave me a whipping. It was not until 1958 that I bought my first camera and decided to take photographs.

In 1969, having been married to my Rosemary for a year I took some nude photographs of her. I have no idea why that happened. What is important for me is that they were portraits. My idea of eroticism was far away from my mind or I simply did not acknowledge it.

In 1975 my wife, two daughters and I moved to Vancouver. By 1977 I was taking nude photographs on Wreck Beach. Here is my first ever nude in Vancouver of April. There is nothing erotic about it. It does show what soon became of my photographic particulars. This was to have something odd in my photographs. The black sand on April’s feet is such an example.

Now today April 4, 2026 I have finally understood my obsession in taking photographs of undraped women. It is most obvious that looking back at the many Renaissance of women and men in the nude had a purpose beyond the obvious of wanting to do it. The nude without clothes, when done well, prepared one to paint them with clothes on. It showed how the body moved and how to paint it gracefully.

Now in this century, here in Vancouver nude figure studies places are happening. Why? It is for the same above reason. I cannot go to these because I cannot draw. But I have done my own version of nude figure studying.

I can state here that my portraits of people are good simply because I have knowledge of how their bodies are and I know how to pose them.