Meet Mickey Forss, half-brother of George Forss, my friend and the famous New York landscape photographer. Mickey lives with George in Cambridge, N.Y. and he can usually be found near a local pharmacy and convenience store. I have wanted to do some portraits of Mickey for some time, and he and George talked about it today and both are happy with the idea.

Me, too. You will be seeing Mickey regularly on the blog, it is a privilege to photograph him. Like his brother George, Mickey has a powerful back-story. He grew up with George in New York City, was drawn into the 1960’s counter-cultural movement, and suffered neurological damage from heavy drug use. Mickey was hospitalized and diagnosed with schizophrenia. He vanished from George’s life for seven years and then one day, a disheveled, bearded street man sat down next to George in a Chock Full O’Nuts coffee shop in Manhattan and said, “how’s Norma?,” the name of George’s mother. George had found his brother, and he has been helping to care for him ever since.

Micky lived in Brooklyn for some time, and when George moved upstate in 1989, he brought Mickey with him, but he ran off to New York several times, and George and friends and the police would spend months looking for him – he gravitated to life under the boardwalk at Coney Island. Mickey is now stable on medications and is content with his life in Cambridge, he lives upstairs from George and is well-known among locals and merchants, who sometimes give him coffee and soda and donate clothes. I talked with Mickey this afternoon, where I found him sitting in front of a local store, where he often sits in the afternoon, today with a can of soda. Mickey has seen me at George’s apartment and gallery, he knows me. He is gentle, sometimes child-like, shy about talking but courteous and friendly.

I asked him if it was okay if I took his picture and came back from time to time to record some images of his life, and he said yes, he would be happy to do that. He didn’t want any money but accepted a cup of coffee. It is my hope to return and photograph Mickey, he is a presence in my town and in my mind. George is a profoundly sweet and caring man, and Mickey is another compelling and poignant chapter in the life of the remarkable genius, my friend. He is now a part of my life, a part of the Bedlam Farm lexicon. So I’m putting up two photos of Mickey Forss today and introducing him to you, you will see more of him. I hope to capture his life in images over time.

It is a gift to live here and have so much to photograph and care about.