As time goes by, I realize that, for most boys at least, mother is where you’ve been and father is what you will become. For me, raising men is a strange art form, where as a mother you must step out of the picture in order to let the relationship between father and son grow; you need to give these two men space so that that can find out what part they play in each other’s lives, allow them to accept, fight and disappoint one another before eventually mirroring each other.

This exact bond and the way it develops over time is the main subject of an ongoing documentary project by American photographer Kristen Schmid, who is also a mother of two boys. Her Father to Son series documents, explores and celebrates the relationship between her husband and their first son since the boy’s birth in 2006, all in a very simple and unpretentious way. As she takes a step back to observe and to nurture the intense, complex and evolving relationship between her husband and their oldest son, Schmid follows the fluid connection between these two people, without them always being aware of her presence. ‘‘This influential bond forms slowly, a little bit at a time,’’ Schmid notes. ‘‘Their everyday interactions are more meaningful than even they realize… They are not always aware of each other's perspective, or how their actions affect each other. Sometimes they don’t see how similar they are.’’ 

On the third Sunday of June (in 2015 the 21st of June), Father’s day is celebrated in 76 countries around the world.

{YatzerTip} The clearest sound an unborn baby hears through the womb is that of its father’s voice. Experts claim that the best way to calm an unsettled infant is by laying it to rest on its father’s chest, while he speaks to his child, thus reproducing the womb memory.