The Styrous® Viewfinder: Josie Iselin ~ Loving Blind / Seeing Red: A Mother's Decade

May 4, 2019

Josie Iselin ~ Loving Blind / Seeing Red: A Mother's Decade

Josie Iselin ~ Loving Blind / Seeing Red: A Mother's Decade

Photos of book by Styrous®

Today I went to the opening of an exhibition, Mother (link below), at the K Gallery in Alameda. One of the works in the exhibition is a book by photographer Josie Iselin that is a beautiful testament to what it means to be a mother. A page from the book, Pregnant, is a sample that illustrates the beauty of her images as well as the humor she sees of what being a mother entails.

Josie Iselin ~ Pregnant

Loving Blind / Seeing Red: A Mother's Decade

Josie Iselin ~ Pregnant

Loving Blind / Seeing Red: A Mother's Decade

Josie Iselin ~ Pregnant

Loving Blind / Seeing Red: A Mother's Decade

She told me she has tried to publish this book but the publishers she submitted it to were not interested. Talk about a lack of vision!

Her newest book, The Curious World of Seaweed, focusing on the seaweed stories of our Pacific Coast, explores both the artistic and the biological presence of sixteen seaweeds and kelps that live in the thin region where the Pacific Ocean converges with the North American continent―a place of incomparable richness. Each species receives a detailed description of its structure, ecological importance, and humans’ scientific inquiry into it, told in scientifically illuminating yet deeply reverent and inspired prose. Throughout the writings are historical botanical illustrations and Iselin’s signature, Marimekko-like portraits of each specimen that reveal their vibrant colors―whether rosy, “olivaceous,” or grass-green―and whimsical shapes. Iselin posits that we can learn not only about the seaweeds but also from them: their resilience, their resourcefulness, their poetry and magic.