Rather than letting social distancing keep him from his passion for photography, Dave Puente has found a way to join local families in celebrating the silver linings of quarantine.
The photographer from Minneapolis, Minnesota has been taking free family portraits that document the joyful part of community members being at home with their loved ones—and he does it all while simultaneously respecting social distancing guidelines.
Over the course of the last two weeks, Puente has driven 1,365 miles to 146 homes in order to take photos of families on their porches for his heartwarming “Porchtrait” project.
Each family portrait is captioned with a heartwarming or amusing anecdote form the family—and with Puente taking the pictures from a distance, the series manages to capture a unique sneak peek into the lives of families waiting out the COVID-19 outbreaks.
“I wanted to give somebody something that they can hang on the wall and in a few years look back on it and in such a frantic and scary time see there was some silver lining to it,” Puente told WCCO News. “It’s therapeutic for me and it’s been that way… for so many people.”
Since Puente began publishing his Porchtraits to social media, he has been flooded with messages of support and appreciation for the project.
As a means of financing his labor of love and paying his bills, Puente also created a GoFundMe page for the Porchtraits project.
Since launching the campaign last week, he has received more than $900 in donations.
“The reality is, this effort has a expiration date, and with your help, I can continue to photograph family’s for free and serve this incredible community in this unique way during these uncertain times,” wrote Puente. “This has been the highlight of my professional career and with your help, we can keep it going.”
If you want to check out more of Puente’s Porchtraits series, you can either visit his website or his Instagram page.
This is just one of many positive stories and updates that are coming out of the COVID-19 news coverage this week. For more uplifting coverage on the outbreaks, click here.
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