Yesterday I was given the stunning news that my friend, Cindy Schafer, had been killed, along with her husband, Bruce Haskitt, in a small plane crash near Vancouver. I’ve spent all day processing this devasting news, which is so hard to absorb because when I had lunch with her a month or so ago, she was full of life and full of the future. I don’t know what I can do other than share Cindy and her photography with you.

I met Cindy several years ago,when she took a class from me–she was an ideal student, always smiling and engaged and positive. She had done a lot of travel and commercial photography and wanted to figure out a way to package her work that would make it appealing to the fine art market. We spent some time going through her work and it became clear that she was fascinated with laundry from all over the world–she took that idea and made it better. I wrote about this series on Lenscratch this past August. She continually worked to find her voice, to find a way to talk about the world. She recently updated her website, wrote a blog, and just opened a show in Los Angeles.

This summer, Cindy and I hosted a photographer’s party–she was a foodie and her contributions to any event were quite spectacular, and she was the kind of friend who arrives two hours early to set up and stays until the last dish is done. She was kind and thoughtful, touching the lives of everyone she came in contact with. She knew want she wanted from life and went for it–that thought consoles me, especially when I think of her on her windswept island or traveling to far flung places, or making a gourmet dinner for friends, or working as a photographer at the Oscars. She was compeletely engaged in life.

She was passionate about the environment. Cindy and her husband lived part time on a little island near Seattle and Vancouver and being close to nature (plus she grew up on a farm) made her hyper conscious about what we are consuming, and how we are taking care of our planet.

She recently posted these images by Chris Jordan on her blog:

Cindy’s new work, Mates, is a series of Holga images taken on her travels in Asia, India, and the Czech Republic.

My heart goes out to her family in Canada, and to her friends, and I know I speak for the Los Angeles photo community which she so actively supported, in saying, we love you and thank you for bringing so much light into our lives. You will be missed and will always live in our hearts.