I never knew the words to speak about my "lost" brother and today I do, may this video be the next step in it becoming a common language.

"(un)Forgotten" is a project based on a topic that we rarely spoke of when I was growing up. The story of how, in the 50’s, Intellectually Challenged children were sent to institutions and pretty much “forgotten” about. I know this story well, because this is what happened to my brother Andy.

Mansfield Training School and Hospital

I hated this place my whole life growing up. I only went once when I was 17, and it scared me. I went to visit my brother... Mansfield Training School, an institute for the "Feebleminded", shut down in the '90s for all the right reasons. Overcrowding, abuse, neglect, sanitation, etc. The people living there were then placed in small home communities, my brother being one. Today he still lives in the same one he was transferred to and is extremely lucky. He is also one of my favorite people on this earth.

As for Mansfield... it was donated to the University of Connecticut and has since been abandoned. Overgrown, boarded up, and left, actually left as it was. Strangely, just left. Papers everywhere, toilet paper rolls still full, patients’ files... it's eerie.

While I was in Boston in August, I went and photographed it. I really wanted to see and be in Andy’s history. I was ready to do a whole photo essay on how terrible it was — all in black and white. However, when I got there and started shooting, I keep seeing signs of effort. Signs that somebody did once care. I actually found it hard to hate the place. I am still sad for all those who were there, but there’s no hate. Here’s the photo that changed what my heart knew, it was the houses on the curtain.