A photographer is taking free portraits of frontline workers with their families to thank them for everything they're doing
Samantha Grindell
- Ron and Bless Soliman are Delaware-based wedding photographers.
- Since the coronavirus pandemic started, Ron has been taking portraits of frontline workers with their families for free in Delaware, New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia.
- "I want people to remember that these are frontline workers during a pandemic who made a lot of sacrifices, and they will go down in history," Ron said of his work.
- Insider also spoke with some of Ron's subjects, who said the photo shoots made them feel a sense of pride in their work.
- Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.
Ron plans to continue taking these portraits as long as he can amid the pandemic.
You can see more photos from the project on his website.
The subjects Insider interviewed also encouraged people to keep following social distancing and healthcare guidelines to help curb the spread of the virus.
And if you are a frontline worker in Ron Soliman's area, you can contact him here about setting up a free portrait for your family.
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Ron hopes his photo series makes frontline workers' sacrifices feel more real for people.
"I think people need to know that these frontline workers also have families," Ron told Insider.
"They work all day and come home, and there are families who care about them."
"That worker is also scared about his family and the people that he knows," he added.
"Before, it used to be just a job," Amparo said of their work.
"But the photo shoot put it into perspective that what you're doing is extra important to society," he said.
"It gets you thinking that you're taking care of other people that have families themselves," Amparo added. "It makes you appreciate your job more and yourself more."
"I take more pride in what I do now," he said. "And the way I look at it is as long as we have each other, everything is well."
When Ron reached out about the photo shoot, the couple felt like it was the perfect opportunity to take a break.
"I was excited because they're very good photographers," Cosico said of her initial reaction to Ron's offer, as she knew his and Bless' work from friends' weddings.
"Since the whole COVID thing happened, I stopped wearing makeup," she also said. "So I was like, 'Oh, let me do my hair, let me put makeup on,'" with the shoot giving her an opportunity to feel like her old self.
The couple also said the shoot made them feel a sense of renewed pride in their work.
"We're part of the history," Cosico said.
The photo shoot took Brigitte Cosico and Larry Amparo's minds off the pandemic and their postponed wedding.
Cosico and Amparo are both night-shift nurses based in New Jersey, and they've been treating patients with COVID-19 since the pandemic reached their area.
They get home around midnight each night, and they have to shower and wash their scrubs immediately to prevent the virus from spreading through their home.
"It's very emotional and very tiring," Cosico said of their work. "Patients you've had for years are just dying. They don't stand a chance, and you see them deteriorating so fast."
"It's very heartbreaking. It takes a toll on a lot of the employees in our facility," she added.
On top of everything else, the couple had to postpone their wedding ceremony as a result of the virus, making this time even harder for them.
Hanna also said the shoot took her mind off the pandemic for a bit.
"It was the day before Mother's Day, and I have two teenage daughters," she said of her time with Ron.
"It was actually a really happy day because it celebrated me still being here for my daughters and my husband, and me being able to work as a nurse still."
"I felt so grateful to Ron and that he picked me to be part of this project, and just so proud to be a nurse and be a healthcare worker and be able to help," she added.
Kate Hanna, a nurse working at a VA hospital, felt a sense of pride during the shoot.
Hanna hadn't worked in almost a year when the pandemic started, as she suffered a traumatic brain injury in 2019.
She came back to work to help those suffering as a result of the coronavirus, putting her life on the line.
"I still feel like I'm doing the work that I'm meant to do," she said. "I feel useful at a time like this."
"I've been a nurse for 17 years and after a nine-month break having to be off on medical leave, I felt so proud," Hanna added.
"I enjoyed being able to document this part of our life so we can look back and see the silver lining," Brittany said.
"The coronavirus has hurt a lot of people physically, emotionally, financially, but when I stop and see it through my children's eyes, they just see time at home as a family," she said.
"We've slowed down without being able to travel and one of us home with them at all times since daycare has closed," Brittany explained. "They don't recognize the significance of the pandemic or what daddy is seeing every day when he walks into the ER."
"When they're older and we tell them about this time, I hope we can remember it wasn't all negative memories, and the pictures Ron and Bless took are evidence of that," she said.
Ron finds families to shoot through connections from working in the wedding industry and by word of mouth.
For instance, he got in touch with doctors Brittany and Mike Hansen for the project.
"They were the photographers at our wedding six years ago when we were both in residency," Brittany Hansen told Insider of Ron and Bless. "We've seen each other a few times since our wedding when they photographed for friends' weddings and kept in touch."
"Mike is an ER doctor, so working frontline managing COVID-19 at Christiana. I'm a pediatrician at Temple and have switched to mostly telemedicine and going in for newborns and essential visits," she said of their work at the moment.
Brittany said the shoot gave her a different perspective on the pandemic.
All of the photos are in black and white, and Ron has his subjects pose in their work attire.
"I wanted to make them make them feel like timeless images," Ron said of the black-and-white filter.
Ron is also having the subjects pose in their frontline uniforms, driving home the work they're doing during the pandemic.
"I want people to remember that these are frontline workers during a pandemic who made a lot of sacrifices, and they will go down in history," the photographer explained.
The couple has been doing free porch sessions with frontline workers and their families.
Ron and Bless are traveling by car to get to families in Delaware, New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia.
Ron takes the pictures while social distancing, standing on the edge of the families' yards to capture them.
The sessions are completely free.
Ron Soliman is a wedding photographer by trade.
Ron and his wife, Bless Soliman, shoot weddings consistently in Delaware and the surrounding area, but their schedules have been open since the coronavirus pandemic hit the United States.
"Right now, all of our weddings from March through June are pretty much canceled or postponed," Ron told Insider.
As Ron started to see Americans head to the front line to help amid the virus, he wondered if there was anything he could do to give back.
"Maybe I can use my talents to kind of ease up that pain?" he thought to himself. "So I talked to my wife and I said, 'I know it's kind of scary to be out there, but maybe we'll do drive-by photo shoots.'"
Bless immediately agreed.
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