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Looking For The Light: The Hidden Life and Art of Marion Post Wolcott
Working for the Farm Security Administration, Marion Post Wolcott traveled across Depression-ravaged America contributing to an incomparable documentary record and photographic legacy. Magnificently illustrated with more than 75 Wolcott photographs, here is a long-overdue celebration of one of the most brilliant photographers of the 20th century.
- GenresBiographyPhotography
297 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1992
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
February 20, 2014
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I am so glad Paul Hendrickson did not (as he did consider it) kill himself over his deep and frustrating depression before he discovered the photographs and life of Marion Post Wolcott. Grateful her life seemed important enough to save his own. Paul Hendrickson, in my opinion, is the very best biographer working today. He does not leave a rock unturned or many trails untraveled in his quest to find the truth or better story behind his subject.
Hendrickson writes how he became a part of this book while researching it, how he realized that he had to be in it, a part of it, contrary to the norm in the customary reporting of a life. I liken his craft of writing to what is called creative non-fiction. Of course, those who know and operate under that banner might disagree with me, but I am speaking from a stance of how I feel about the words “creative nonfiction”. There are stories to tell and many ways to tell them. Rather than a chronological, linear straight reporting or storytelling, Hendrickson veers off the roads, many of them, to give us a clearer understanding of how layered and dirty a life can be. Anyone who has traveled without the use of luxuries can better understand what I am talking about when I speak of the grime and stink associated with the open road. When you get the bigger picture the beauty is even more astounding.
The life of Marion Post Wolcott was beautiful and worthy of this book written about her. She was an amazing talent who was all too human and suffered the pitfalls we all experience as we stumble through life. Hendrickson worked hard at discovering why a woman with so much talent, and what the future might selfishly hold for her, seemed to suddenly quit her craft in order to raise a family and build a life bigger than her own. And it is exactly that, the previous statement that Hendrickson found so convincing. In her later years, in a loving letter to her from a grandchild, Marion showed why art, and our ideas of what art is, are sometimes overshadowed and engulfed by the love in serving others and being close in times of need. Of course, there are many other facets that went into Marion Post Wolcott’s decision to quit her art, and nobody but Hendrickson could have presented it better.
I have seen criticism of this book that Hendrickson was being too self-indulgent, that the book was too focused on his own feelings about Marion, his fascination with her, even his admitted fantasy with the attractive woman of the past. In another sentence by the same critic you will also read how the long book makes you actually look at yourself, much the same as what happened to Hendrickson. Hard to have it both ways in my book. But no matter what the critics say, facts are: Looking For The Light is another tantalizing read written by Paul Hendrickson. It is at once erotic and sensual, dark and disarming, feminine and masculine in all its projections whether from the voice and images of the past or the still-living who remember her most for what she was in all her beauty, a mother of long accomplishment and good wife.
I am so glad Paul Hendrickson did not (as he did consider it) kill himself over his deep and frustrating depression before he discovered the photographs and life of Marion Post Wolcott. Grateful her life seemed important enough to save his own. Paul Hendrickson, in my opinion, is the very best biographer working today. He does not leave a rock unturned or many trails untraveled in his quest to find the truth or better story behind his subject.
Hendrickson writes how he became a part of this book while researching it, how he realized that he had to be in it, a part of it, contrary to the norm in the customary reporting of a life. I liken his craft of writing to what is called creative non-fiction. Of course, those who know and operate under that banner might disagree with me, but I am speaking from a stance of how I feel about the words “creative nonfiction”. There are stories to tell and many ways to tell them. Rather than a chronological, linear straight reporting or storytelling, Hendrickson veers off the roads, many of them, to give us a clearer understanding of how layered and dirty a life can be. Anyone who has traveled without the use of luxuries can better understand what I am talking about when I speak of the grime and stink associated with the open road. When you get the bigger picture the beauty is even more astounding.
The life of Marion Post Wolcott was beautiful and worthy of this book written about her. She was an amazing talent who was all too human and suffered the pitfalls we all experience as we stumble through life. Hendrickson worked hard at discovering why a woman with so much talent, and what the future might selfishly hold for her, seemed to suddenly quit her craft in order to raise a family and build a life bigger than her own. And it is exactly that, the previous statement that Hendrickson found so convincing. In her later years, in a loving letter to her from a grandchild, Marion showed why art, and our ideas of what art is, are sometimes overshadowed and engulfed by the love in serving others and being close in times of need. Of course, there are many other facets that went into Marion Post Wolcott’s decision to quit her art, and nobody but Hendrickson could have presented it better.
I have seen criticism of this book that Hendrickson was being too self-indulgent, that the book was too focused on his own feelings about Marion, his fascination with her, even his admitted fantasy with the attractive woman of the past. In another sentence by the same critic you will also read how the long book makes you actually look at yourself, much the same as what happened to Hendrickson. Hard to have it both ways in my book. But no matter what the critics say, facts are: Looking For The Light is another tantalizing read written by Paul Hendrickson. It is at once erotic and sensual, dark and disarming, feminine and masculine in all its projections whether from the voice and images of the past or the still-living who remember her most for what she was in all her beauty, a mother of long accomplishment and good wife.
June 28, 2017
Though he went on to bigger books, this remains my favorite by Paul Hendrickson -- a satisfying and slightly heartbreaking exploration of why someone quits something that they're very good at doing, and what we can all learn from the almost terrifying idea that an artist (photographer, writer, whatever) can gain as much or more from stopping as she can from continuing on...
to-buy
February 20, 2018Recommended by Walt Harrington in “telling true stories” especially chapter ore to an instrument
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews