Camera captures old Florida

Madelyn McMillian-Wise, 62, photographs things that evoke memories of a less chaotic time.

By ELIZABETH BETTENDORF , Times Staff Writer
Published August 29, 2007

NEW PORT RICHEY - Madelyn McMillian-Wise came to Tarpon Springs as a young girl in 1949, and in her heart never left west-central Florida.

Now she's back, camera in hand, trolling traffic-logged U.S. 19 hunting for images of the Florida that once was.

"When I see something I have to be able to isolate it because there's a lot of junk around," she says. "Any time I see something that catches my breath, I pull off. If I don't and I come back later it won't be the same. The light will have changed."

Most of her images, printed on canvas, look more like oil paintings than photos; they are dreamlike and spiritual, evoking her own vision of memory and longing.

A shaggy palm tree at night becomes nature's sculpture; mossy pilings beneath a pier turn to abstraction; a wooden cross erected by net fishermen becomes a forgotten political statement.

"I love photographing Florida," she says, "partly because I live here and have access, partly because it captures a memory for me."

While driving over a bridge near the Crab Shack, she spotted an elegant old heat-cracked window of an abandoned building; she found the derelict antique yacht in a lushly overgrown lot near the oldest house in New Port Richey; she found the perfect warm twilight settling in over fishing boats in Cedar Key while lingering one day and not doing much of anything.

"In the winter down here, about a half-hour before sunset, you get that golden glow," she says. "On that night I just waited until it came."

At 62, McMillian-Wise arrived at photography the long way, after working several careers and raising a family. She's sold insurance and owned a pub and general store in Fowler's Bluff along the Suwannee River where she lived for more than a decade.

[Last modified August 28, 2007, 22:04:07]