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Golden Years

13 side-by-side portraits of people over 100 with their younger selves

These powerful before-and-after photos reveal just how beautiful aging can be.

via Jan Langer/Aktualne

Jan Langer's incredible photos are timeless.

Czech photographer Jan Langer's portrait series "Faces of Century" shows them in a different light: as human beings aged by years of experience, but at their deepest level, unchanged by the passing of time. In the series, Langer juxtaposes his portraits with another portrait of the subject from decades earlier. He recreates the original pose and lighting as closely as he can — he wants us to see them not just as they are now, but how they have and haven't changed over time. That is the key to the series.

These are the rare faces of people who have lived through two world wars, a cavalcade of regimes, and the rush of advancements in modern life. These photos, and the stories of the lives lived by the people in them, show not only the beauty of aging, but how even as we age, we still remain essentially ourselves.


1. Prokop Vejdělek, at age 22 and 101

All photos by Jan Langer.

Vejdělek is a former metallurgical engineer who will never forget the taste of warm fresh goat's milk.

2. Bedřiška Köhlerová, at age 26 and 103

Originally born in Merano, Italy, Köhlerová wishes to visit Italy one more time.

3. Ludvík Chybík, at age 20 and 102

Chybík is a former postal carrier and says he will never forget the route he worked every day.

4. Vincenc Jetelina, at age 30 and 105

Jetelina spent eight years in prison after World War II. Now, he just wants to live the rest of his life in peace.

5. Marie Fejfarová, at age 101

Fejfarová burned all her material memories, including old photographs, when she decided to move to a long-term care facility. She lived a dramatic life, hiding from the Nazis and then the Russians, but eventually she was able to travel the world with her husband. Her experiences show there's no such thing as too late in life to start a new chapter.

6. Antonín Kovář, at age 25 and 102

Kovář is a former musician whose daughter comes to visit him every day. He wishes to play the clarinet once more.

7. Anna Vašinová, at age 22 and 102

Vašinová will always remember the day her husband was taken away by the Nazis. She wishes to be reunited with him after death.

8. Stanislav Spáčil, at age 17 and 102

Spáčil was an electrical engineer throughout his life and thinks that it's too early in his life to think about the past.

9. Anna Pochobradská, at age 30 and 100

Pochobradská was a farmer. She now lives a quiet life and is thankful that her daughter visits her every weekend.

10. Antonín Baldrman, at age 17 and 101

Baldrman was a clerk early in life and keeps up with current events by reading the newspaper.

11. Marie Burešová, at age 23 and 101

Burešová loves talking to her family and wishes to have them all together again.

12. Vlasta Čížková, at age 23 and 101

Čížková cooked in the dining room at the airport in the small village of Vodochody. She'll never forget reciting her own poetry at wedding ceremonies.

13. Ludmila Vysloužilová, at age 23 and 101

Vysloužilová stays active every day by chopping wood, shoveling snow, and doing work around her house.

The photographer Langer was initially inspired to document the lives of elderly people because of what he saw as the media's lack of coverage of them. He decided to focus on people over the age of 100 — a very rare demographic indeed. The 2010 U.S. Census reported only 53,364 centenarians, which is only 0.19% of the population of people 70 years or older.

“One should live every single moment according to their best knowledge and conscience because one day we will see clearly what has a real value," Langer says of what he learned from his subjects while photographing them.

The series was originally part of a story that Langer did for the Czech news outlet aktuálně.cz. You can see more photos from the portrait sessions by following the link.


This article originally appeared seven years ago.



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photography
Education

In 125 years, millions of people have looked at this painting. No one really saw it until recently.

Van Gogh saw something it took scientists another 100 years to see.

Image from Wikimedia Commons.

Van Gogh’s Starry Night.

Van Gogh never got to enjoy his own historic success as an artist (even though we've been able to imagine what that moment might have looked like). But it turns out that those of us who have appreciated his work have been missing out on some critical details for more than 100 years.

I'm not easily impressed, OK?

I know Van Gogh was a genius. If the point of this were "Van Gogh was a mad genius," I would not be sharing this with you.

But I found this and I thought, "Oh, what a vaguely interesting thing." And then I got to the part about the Hubble Space Telescope, and, let me tell you: Mind. Blown.

We've got the set up here, but you have to watch the video for the full effect. It's all the way at the bottom.

Get this: Van Gogh was a pretty cool artist (duh), but as it turns out...

painting, science, psychotic

What’s the truth behind when you take off an ear?

assets.rebelmouse.io

...he was also A SCIENTIST!*

*Pretty much.

Here's the story.

While Van Gogh was in an asylum in France, after he mutilated his ear during a psychotic episode*...

(*Or, and I'd like to thank the entire Internet for pointing this out, there's a theory that his friend Paul Gauguin actually cut off his ear, in a drunken sword fight, in the dark. The more you know!)

science, premonition, predictions

Animated a thinking one-eared Van Gogh.

All Van Gogh GIFs via TED-Ed.

...he was able to capture one of science's most elusive concepts:

~~~TURBULENCE~~~

research, studied, proof, genius

Animated "Starry Night."

assets.rebelmouse.io

turbulence, fluid dynamics, energy cascade

Turbulence expressed through art.

assets.rebelmouse.io

Although it's hard to understand with math (like, REALLY HARD), it turns out that art makes it easy to depict how it LOOKS.

So what is turbulence?

Turbulence, or turbulent flow, is a concept of fluid dynamics where fluid movements are "self-similar" when there's an energy cascade — so basically, big eddies make smaller eddies, and those make even smaller ones ... and so on and so forth.

It looks like this:

figures, explanation, education, community

Pictures explain science.

assets.rebelmouse.io

See? It's easier to look at pictures to understand it.

Thing is, scientists are pretty much *just* starting to figure this stuff out.

reference, research, wisdom

Animation of referencing art to science.

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Then you've got Van Gogh, 100 years earlier, in his asylum, with a mutilated ear, who totally nailed it!

illumination, luminance, pulsing

Science studying Van Gogh.

assets.rebelmouse.io

The folks who noticed Van Gogh's ability to capture turbulence checked to see whether other artists did the same. Most impressionists achieved " luminance" with their art (which is the sort-of *pulsing* you see when you look at their paintings that really shows what light looks like).

But did other artists depict turbulence the way Van Gogh did?

NOPE.

The Scream, historical, popular, famous

Animated “The Scream."

assets.rebelmouse.io

Not even "The Scream" could hold a candle to Van Gogh!

technology, star turbulence, sky, astronomy

Capturing concepts of nature.

assets.rebelmouse.io

Even in his darkest time, Van Gogh was able to capture — eerily accurately — one of nature's most complex and confusing concepts ... 100 years before scientists had the technology to observe actual star turbulence and realize its similarity to fluid turbulence mathematics as well as Van Gogh's swirling sky. Cool, huh?

Watch the video below to learn even more:

This article originally appeared on 11.14.14

From Your Site Articles
Pop Culture

Guy reveals why the 'old man praying’ painting you see everywhere is not what it seems

It started as a photograph.

via Wikimedia Commons

The Minnesota state photograph "Grace" by Eric Enstrom depicts traveling salesman Charles Wilden in Bovey, Minnesota.

The painting of an old devout man praying over a bowl of gruel and a loaf of bread in front of a Bible is one of the most popular pieces of 20th century American art. The piece is called “Grace” and you’ll find it in homes, churches and even restaurants.

I clearly remember there was a copy of it hanging on the wall at my corner burger joint, Mack’s Burgers, in Torrance, California, in the ’80s. Sadly, it’s been torn down and is now a Jack in the Box.

However ubiquitous the photo may be, a new video by pop culture YouTube user Austin McConnell shows that “Grace” isn’t really what it seems.

“Grace” was originally a photograph taken in 1918, during World War I, by Eric Enstrom, a Swedish American from Bovey, Minnesota. Enstrom was preparing some photographs to take with him to a convention when Charles Wilden, a salesman selling boot scrapers, came to his door, and he know he had to take his photo.

“There was something about the old gentleman’s face that immediately impressed me. I saw that he had a kind face… there weren’t any harsh lines in it,” Enstrom said. “I wanted to take a picture that would show people that even though they had to do without many things because of the war they still had much to be thankful for,” he added.

“There was something about the old gentleman’s face that immediately impressed me. I saw that he had a kind face… there weren’t any harsh lines in it,” Enstrom said. “I wanted to take a picture that would show people that even though they had to do without many things because of the war they still had much to be thankful for,” he added.

Enstrom posed Wilden in front of a loaf of bread, a bowl—which may have been empty—and a large book that many assume to be the Bible. But, as McConnell notes, the book is far too large to be the good book, as most people assume. The Grand Forks Herald claims that a receipt for payment from Enstrom to Wilden reveals that the book is a dictionary.

The photograph went on to be a huge hit at the convention and Enstrom began selling copies about town. After many requested copies of the photo in color, Enstrom’s daughter, Rhoda Nyberg, began hand-painting them in oils and added a streak of light on the left side of the painting. This is the version that people have come to love.

"The intent of the photo is fairly obvious,” McConnell says in the video. “Enstrom wanted an image that conveyed to people that even though they had to do without many provisions because of the ongoing war, there was still much to be thankful for. A picture that seemed to say 'this man doesn't have much of earthly goods, but he has more than most people because he has a thankful heart.'"

Enstrom convinced Wilden to sign over his rights for $5, which gave him the sole copyright. He then licensed the image to the Lutheran-affiliated Augsburg publishing house, which distributed the image across the country.

According to McConnell “thousands and thousands” of copies of the photo were sold. The image entered the public domain in 1995.

Although not much is known about Wilden, it is believed that he lived a hard life. "He was living in a very primitive sod hut near Grand Rapids, eking out a very precarious living," retired history professor Don Boese told the Grand Forks Herald. It’s also likely that he wasn’t the devout man we imagine in the photo. "The stories about him centered more around drinking and not accomplishing very much,” Boese said.

So the painting was actually a photo. The Bible, a dictionary, and the subject was more likely to be the town drunk than a saint. But, in the end, does it matter? McConnell believes that its meaning rests in the eye of the beholder.

"If you found out today that everything you thought you knew about this iconic image was actually wrong, would you take it off your wall?” McConnell asks at the end of the video. “Or would you accept that the value in a piece of art isn't merely derived from the knowledge of how it was made? Or who made it?”


This article originally appeared on 1.6.23

From Your Site Articles
art
Joy

Teen honors local UPS driver with a tiny public diorama and his reaction is so wholesome

Brandon is beloved in the community.

Images courtesy of Andrea Hanson/Instagram

Brandon the UPS driver checks out the art installation made in his honor.

Service workers help our communities run more smoothly, but their contributions can often go unrecognized. In some instances, however, people in service jobs become household names and beloved fixtures in their community.

A UPS driver named Brandon is apparently one of those people in Red Wing, Minnesota.

Red Wing resident Andrea Hanson shared how her 14-year-old daughter Mari created a delightful art installation called "Petite Postal Place Featuring: Brandon." Set in a tiny box, the square diorama includes shelves of mini boxes and packages with incredible detail, right down to the Amazon Prime packaging and barcodes, with Brandon the UPS driver standing among them.

Hanson shared a video on Instagram of Brandon's reaction to seeing the art installed next to the postal box in his honor, and it's so wholesome. "Shut up!" he kept saying. "I love it…that is the coolest thing ever."

Watch:

Brandon clearly appreciated the gesture—"She made that just for me, though?"—and was blown away by Mari's attention to detail—"The Chewy box!"

Other people also loved the art as well as Brandon's reaction to it:

"Bless all delivery drivers!!!! You have no idea how much that made his day!"

"It’s the 'shut up' and the '4H' and 'fair' giving me those MN vibes. Love this so much."

"“Wait til my buddies see this” awwwwwww.❤️"

"Love his reaction. Saying he’s gonna share with his friends at work. 🥹"

"That is so cool!!! She is very VERY talented! 👏👏 And that is the cutest reaction ever. 🥹🥹"

"Love this. ❤️ His genuine appreciation and love he felt. Nice job!"

Mari's art is part of the Art in the Alley community initiative "designed to turn overlooked spaces in downtown Red Wing into vibrant, engaging places, through the power of community art." The people of Red Wing are encouraged to add something artistic to spaces like the alley where Mari put her art piece and to go check out what others have done.

Mari shared a description of "Petite Postal Place Featuring: Brandon" on the city's downtown website along with her history with art:

photo of mini diorama"Petite Postal Place Featuring: Brandon" by Mari HansonPhoto courtesy of Andrea Hanson

A miniature postal room with shelves filled with packages. Brandon the UPS man is standing proudly in front of the boxes, ready to deliver parcels with his radiant personality. Bio: Once I had the capability to hold a marker, I have been creating artwork. One thing that has been on my Christmas list every year is art supplies. Our dining table was always filled with clay, markers, paint, and paper. When my Dad moved to a new office in the house, I got his old one (which is now turned into my art room). It is filled with every art supply imaginable and is all in its own organized spot. Now I spend hours there every day, creating whatever I think up.

Hanson shared with Upworthy's audience on Instagram that her daughter was thrilled that her art has been making the viral rounds and that Brandon has been tickled by it as well:

"I just want to say that my daughter is so overwhelmed and grateful you’re seeing her hard work. She’s not on social media yet…only 14. But I’ve shown her you cheering her on to never quit making art. 🫶🏻 You are making a difference in her life. And Brandon feels like a rockstar. (Which he is!) Such well deserved love for our local UPS guy. He deserves a raise!!! ❤️"

It's heartening to see community being celebrated in so many ways here, from Brandon's obviously stellar service to Mari's appreciation through art to the community encouraging artistic expression to the people of the internet sharing the love. There may be a whole lot of ick in the world, but shared joys like this are potent reminders that humanity can be a force for good.

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