The Day-to-Day Life of Albert Hastings

What makes a life?

Depends on who you ask.

In this photo project, photographer KayLynn Deveney seems to have done what many photographers try to do but fail—capture what makes a life, but with such tenderness and respect that the results create a deeply felt and unforgettable experience for the viewer.

KayLynn Deveney met Albert Hastings in southern Wales, where she was studying photography. They were neighbours. Over the years KayLynn documented Albert’s day-to-day life and got him to write captions for the photographs she’d taken of him. The captions add a layer of magic and charm to the project and give us an unexpected glimpse into the beautiful tension between a subject and his photographer (who starts out as a total stranger). The captions and photographs also combine to give us a rare entryway into that strange twilight zone between a man’s interior life and his external world.

“In addition to the photographs of Bert, and the captions he writes, the images of Bert’s folded pajamas, nightcap, space heater atop a biscuit tin, and the simple apparatus he engineered to hold a broken daffodil up straight in a shallow teacup, all speak to me of him. I consider this work to be highly subjective and only a collection of selected moments and details, but for me these small insights have real resonance.”

Albert passed away in 2007 at the age of 91. This is the photo KayLynn chose to end her photobook with:

“I’m not talking to a ghost.
I’m opening the curtains.”
—Albert Hastings