The Fish loves photos.

The Fish loves photos taken by professional photographers.

Here’s hoping you will enjoy the work by Barbara La Valleur. Not only does she shoot, she also writes well. (That’s unusual for a photographer. Just ask former Grand Forks Herald chief shooter John Stennes.) Check out La Valleur’s first blog, “Musings…” on the site nearby.

La Valleur is a retired, award-winning international photojournalist of more than 50 years.

When she was 15, she won a 1937 Chevy, the door prize of a new used car dealership in Battle Lake, Minn. She sold the car to her boyfriend for $50, bought a typewriter and eventually enough camera gear to become a photojournalist.

She was the first person to major in Mass Communications at Moorhead (Minn.) State College, earning her way by toiling as a cub reporter at The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead.

She went on to serve as editor of a newspaper in the U.S. Virgin Islands, chief photographer of the Daily News in Wahpeton-Breckenridge and freelanced for seven German newspapers during her 20 years in Europe.

Upon returning to the U.S. in the early 1990s, her photographs have appeared in The Forum, Women’s Press, Star Tribune, Sun Current, Edina Patch and for cover features of an international nursing magazine.

The mother of two daughters and three grandchildren, thanks to her husband, Arnie Bigbee, they reside in Edina, Minn., and spend time volunteering for several organizations including chairwoman of Public Art Edina and being on the Edina Arts and Culture Commission.

With the help of Arnie, she is photographing Westminster Presbyterian Church’s extensive art archives.

They also love spending time at La Farm, a family farm near Ashby, Minn.

She also has edited three books, self-published 14 photo books since retiring and has recently had her life’s work in a successful photo exhibit, “Love of a Lifetime: 50 Years of Photos in the U.S. and Europe,” which finished a three-month run in Edina and will be shown in an Edina church in April and May and will move to the Evansville Art Center July and August.

La Valleur can be reached at (612) 578-2422 or barbara.lavalleur@gmail.com.