These are some of the photos that were made by my grandfather and survived the time. These photographs (and many more that now are lost), an old Kive camera, and the memory of my grandfather Emil are the reasons why I make photographs now. He died when I was 3 years old, but in my grandmother's house, his photographs were everywhere. He photographed weddings and funerals and made many portraits. Missing him as a child made me want his old Kiev camera, but I was told that I could have it when I learned how to use it. I was 12 years old when I went on my own to our local Community Center In Bistrita, Romania, where I lived, and enrolled on my first course learning how to use a photo camera, how to process a film and how to print a photograph into a darkroom. I still remember the smell of that place.

Some of his prints have marks, probably by me, my sisters, and my cousins when we were kids; some decayed over time. The photographs are a great depiction of how he saw the world around him, he clearly loved people as his work is mainly made of portraits. I wish he was around for longer. His name was Emil Dura;,I was told I used to call him Tati Emil.