Bryan Adams - Fine Art Photography

These photographs have been selected from Bryan Adams’s first book of photography, MADE IN CANADA. Donna graces the cover and the closing photograph inside. She was in the final stages of extreme chemotherapy and radiation treatments when she agreed to be photographed. She was very tired and emotional during the shoot, we spoke about her two children and her husband – she was worried about their well-being without her. At one point, she asked me to touch her shoulder and to feel the cancerous tumours underneath her skin. She showed me the tattoo marks on her chest and back left by the needles of the cancer treatments. She was hopeful that what she had been through would prolong her life and that she could get back to being herself again and go to her children’s dance that night. As she walked out, she requested that I list her only as “Donna” and leave her family name out. I have respected her wishes and felt many times throughout the year that it took to do this book that she was the inspiration, helping to guide me along when I wasn’t going to get the shot I wanted, and encouraging me to keep at it when people were understandably averse to having their picture taken. I think her portrait looks hopeful, but she was my age when she passed away – 38.