2 thoughts on “Family, 1950 – 1975

  1. Hello Leon,
    I’m sure you would hardly remember me. I saw Sharon Goldschmidt last night at Michele Zwi’s birthday dinner at her mother’s place. She said she’d seen you and that she thought I’d find your website interesting. It is, and I really like your photographs. Besides taking me back to my childhood in SA, I really found the other ones very interesting too, and many were very beautiful.
    My mother and I were talking about how your mother used to come over often on a Sunday morning and play Scrabble, a game we have played over the years, and still play regularly.
    I studied art in Reading, UK and then London, and used photography quite a lot. When I got to Australia in 1982 I did a part time technical photography course to make me employable. I’d only got really interested in photography while doing my art course.
    Last year I had an exhibition as part of a Photo Festival here in Sydney, and the photos I sent Sharon G were from that…it was quite a mix of people I knew and admired, and those who were interested in participating. I’m getting a website done at last. My technical knowledge of that stuff is out of date and it would take me too long, so I decided to get some help. Now I’m dredging through all my stuff to put into it. The idea of it came from my dad who had given me some old passport photos. I’d made them these photo grid portraits over time for their 70th birthdays, and then updated them for their 80ths. The idea of an exhibition came from there. My partner Mark suggested I invite people I admire and the project went from there….not in a straight line…all over the place with many changes.
    Anyway, I just thought I’d like to respond to you and tell you that I really like your photographs, and many of them took me back in time by about 40-50 years!
    Keep going, it looks great.
    All the best,
    Sharon Zwi.

    • Hi Sharon,
      I do remember you and of course, your brother Jonathan and your parents. I always loved visiting your home and jumping on the trampoline. I did some searching on the internet and learned a bit more about your life-portraits. We have some common thoughts and work about the subject of portraiture. I like your work and would love to see more of it. The quality of viewing on the web is rather limited. One of the items on my wish list is to visit Oz. So, when I get there I will look you up and hopefully get to see some prints.
      I also found a link to your mom’s book and managed to read some of it online. Fascinating. I did not know that your mother’s route to South Africa included Mexico! I have been recently discovering my own roots and also visited Lithuania this May. Please give my best to Rose. I see that Jonathan lives in New Zealand. Please give him my fond regards too.
      Thank you for your appreciation. This site is the culmination of a lot of hard work, collecting, organizing, scanning and keywording 50 years of photography. I will be updating the site to fill in gaps in the chronological narrative fairly soon.
      All the best,
      Leon

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