Laurie Wilson

Laurie Wilson’s artistic evolution seemed to be fuelled by a peculiarly fervent – even combative – experience of photography, rather than self-cultivation through studying the work of others. Yet in spite of the subjective intensity of his expression he was neither self-regarding nor introspective, but a man whose utterance attained a pitch of lyrical and passionate energy hitherto unknown in Australian landscape photography. In fact he was more than fifty years old before his important work began to emerge. For nearly two decades after World War Two he ran a small, professional studio and was later engaged for some years in the production of camera club work. This late artistic development obviously took place along unusual lines, and was linked with a long and valiant struggle against ill health. Those who would trace Wilson’s history must follow for five decades the prosaic story of his life before the drama of the artist begins to unfold, accelerating through the last ten years to its remarkable realisation wherein the life’s work of this book was achieved.

Excerpt from exhibition catalogue