Why do family portraits matter? I think its because life just gets away from you. And with photographs, we can stop time a little bit. In the only photo of my family when I was growing up, we are standing in front of the house on maybe a Sunday. (We are all dressed up.) I am sure it was taken by my grandma or maybe by a family friend. We are glad to have that photo, since my dad died when I was three. It is a record of that moment in our lives. Compared to all the photos we have in our cell phones these days, the photography from my childhood is very minimal. Seriously (probably because I was a fourth child) there are no baby portraits of me and this family portrait may be the first record of my existence. And the only family portrait we will ever have. I am REALLY glad we have it.

But the photo does not capture love and relationship and cuddling and closeness. I think subconsciously I have a deep inner longing for those things. I didn't realize it for a long time, but my portraits are full of cuddling, closeness, love and relationship. It just is natural to me to have families cuddle and be together. I cringe when I see a stiffly posed family photo and what a waste of a wonderful opportunity to show the relationships and feelings of the moment. It was only after a number of people here in Stuart, Florida, pointed out to me that a "Dultmeier" is easy to spot, that I became conscious of my way of posing.

At this point, since I have been creating family portraits on the Treasure Coast for 20+ years, I have had the experience of providing prints for too many clients who have lost family members and I am ever grateful that I am the one who captured that moment for them. I KNOW the feeling of losing someone, all too well. I am so glad to be told that my portraits capture all the feelings and moments we wish we could hold on to. 

That is why I do this. To capture those things for the families I meet along the way. As we go through the process of creating portraits, I definitely feel a connection to my clients and their families and I very much enjoy getting to know their stories.

No matter what else happens, today can never be relived. We can never get back to our past and our history, no matter how much we would like to. This moment in time, this feeling when your kids are small or when they are tweens (right before those challenging middle school and teen years) or as they are heading out the door toward college or career. Or when they come home to visit with their own families. All those times are milestones that can slip by without notice. I love to look back on portraits of my boys and our family at different stages (though I have to admit to a tinge of sadness that those eras are gone).

I can't stop time, but I can remember by looking at the faces, clothes, locations, smiles. I have the privilege of watching my clients' children grow up and go through the stages of childhood. I love to visit the homes of my clients and hear how much they still enjoy the portrait I did five, ten, twenty or more years ago. I am a visual historian of families. That is why I do what I do.