Photographer in homeless man mystery comes forward

The anonymous photographer who helped raise hundreds of dollars for a homeless Dunedin man is revealing his identity in a bid to continue to honour him after his death.

• Mystery as photos donated to help Port Chalmers homeless man

Allan Adams - who was a familiar sight on the streets of central Dunedin - last year told RNZ's Afternoons that a photographer had taken his picture, sent him a copy and another copy to Port Chalmers art gallery Pea Sea Art to be auctioned on his behalf.

ADRA Care Dunedin, a non-profit organisation which helped Adams, said he died earlier this month.

"The circumstances of his passing is unknown, however what is known was he was found in bed and had no funeral. It's heartbreaking when you hear something like this," ADRA Care Dunedin said in a Facebook post.

"The news of his passing and funeral saddens me. I wish we had known so even if his immediate whanau couldn't be found, we as his Caravan whanau would have been there to celebrate his life with what we knew of him."

James Mitchell has now stepped forward as the photographer and hopes to have a mural of Adams on the streets of Dunedin to honour him.

"I didn't want anyone to know it was me, because ultimately I wanted it to be about sort of someone - him in that situation - being seen and also telling his story. And it was amazing, listening to his story being told ... the local community rallied and suddenly he was seen by everybody," Mitchell told Afternoons.

The photograph raised $2750 for Adams but Mitchell says it also stirred up complex feelings for him.

"I actually went and chatted to him, I think it was earlier this year ... It was quite a sad conversation, really. He struggled with, like a lot of people in that situation, sort of mental health and addiction.

"And the photograph he was given, he actually threw away, and initially you think, wow, but he said ... He looked at it and he had so much shame of the situation he was in, he found it hard to look at himself in sort of that positive light.

"But you understand why he would do that. He was really, really struggling of how he saw himself and had that inner voice, that kind of a lot of people have… but it's hard to get out of that situation."

Adams (Ngāpuhi, Chinese) was born in 1961 in Whakatāne and grew up in the Tūhoe area before leaving for Auckland with his parents in the 1970s when his father, a train driver, moved for work. He ended up in Dunedin in 2001 and over time found himself homeless.

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