On New Year's Day 2019, cancer ushered longtime Seven Days photographer Matthew Thorsen, 51, into his next great adventure. His wife, Diane Sullivan, said he passed peacefully at home; she and one of the couple's cats, Darkness, were by his side. Since then, an avalanche of sweet, sad, funny and loving remembrances on social media and in our email boxes has poured into the Matt-size hole in the Burlington community. Many describe Matt as "magical." It's not a word we typically apply to another adult. But everyone who knew him, even briefly, will understand that, in this case, "magical" refers not to some sleight of hand or deceitfulness but to the ease with which Matt expressed wonder and playfulness. How he was kind and thoughtful and witty and gracious. How he turned a photo shoot into an adventure — even, as one subject put it, "a vacation." [content-8] Matt was fearlessly himself, which made it easier for others to be themselves, too. And, as all adults know, that's not as easy as it should be. "I would never pose like that for anyone else," his subjects commonly said. Or, "Matt made me feel, for a moment, like a rock star." In contemporary parlance, Matt was a unicorn: a rare creature of beauty and seemingly supernatural ability. To be sure, he was unique, not to mention tall, lean and handsome, with a shock of prematurely gray-going-white Jim Jarmusch hair. Unlike a unicorn, however, Matt was never hard to spot. Over the past couple of decades, he was a nearly ubiquitous presence around Burlington, camera in hand, often dressed in wild outfits that cheerfully rejected both fashion and gender norms. His self-made costumes for the annual Magic Hat Mardi Gras Parade are the stuff of legend. In settings from nightclubs to daycare centers, press conferences to New American gatherings, political campaigns to rock concerts, Matt shot thousands of images for Seven Days and our other publications. But photography wasn't just his job. He made pictures constantly — of friends, family, strangers, himself, animals, inanimate objects. The camera was an extension of his arm, his brain. Matt didn't just observe the world; he was compelled to capture it. And he wasn't bound by conventional parameters of acceptability; to Matt, roadkill, a severed finger, an autopsied human head were marvelous subjects. Some thought he was attracted to the macabre, the grisly.…
On New Year's Day 2019, cancer ushered longtime Seven Days photographer Matthew Thorsen, 51, into his next great adventure. His wife, Diane Sullivan, said he passed peacefully at home; she and one of the couple's cats, Darkness, were by his side. Since then, an avalanche of sweet, sad, funny and loving remembrances on social media and in our email boxes has poured into the Matt-size hole in the Burlington community. Many describe Matt as "magical." It's not a word we typically apply to another adult. But everyone who knew him, even briefly, will understand that, in this case, "magical" refers not to some sleight of hand or deceitfulness but to the ease with which Matt expressed wonder and playfulness. How he was kind and thoughtful and witty and gracious. How he turned a photo shoot into an adventure — even, as one subject put it, "a vacation." [content-8] Matt was fearlessly himself, which made it easier for others to be themselves, too. And, as all adults know, that's not as easy as it should be. "I would never pose like that for anyone else," his subjects commonly said. Or, "Matt made me feel, for a moment, like a rock star." In contemporary parlance, Matt was a unicorn: a rare creature of beauty and seemingly supernatural ability. To be sure, he was unique, not to mention tall, lean and handsome, with a shock of prematurely gray-going-white Jim Jarmusch hair. Unlike a unicorn, however, Matt was never hard to spot. Over the past couple of decades, he was a nearly ubiquitous presence around Burlington, camera in hand, often dressed in wild outfits that cheerfully rejected both fashion and gender norms. His self-made costumes for the annual Magic Hat Mardi Gras Parade are the stuff of legend. In settings from nightclubs to daycare centers, press conferences to New American gatherings, political campaigns to rock concerts, Matt shot thousands of images for Seven Days and our other publications. But photography wasn't just his job. He made pictures constantly — of friends, family, strangers, himself, animals, inanimate objects. The camera was an extension of his arm, his brain. Matt didn't just observe the world; he was compelled to capture it. And he wasn't bound by conventional parameters of acceptability; to Matt, roadkill, a severed finger, an autopsied human head were marvelous subjects. Some thought he was attracted to the macabre, the grisly.…