'Wood, Water & Light'

It's a bit scuzzy to recommend a book after it's been remaindered—given all the work the people who made it put into it, it's only fair that they earn something back out of it again—but I missed the, er, boat on this one.

In my view, wooden boats, mainly but not exclusively wind-powered ones, count among the world's great triumphs of design and craftsmanship. Like horses and antique cars, I enjoy them mostly these days as art, and only as art—and then almost entirely in pictures. Still, they're things of great beauty. The best are worthy of reverence.

Benjamin Mendlowitz is one of the great contemporary photographers of wooden watercraft of every description. Joel White, son of Charlotte's Web author and essayist E. B. White, was a naval architect responsible for many superb designs. His life, in turn, was chronicled in A Unit of Water, A Unit of Time: Joel White's Last Boat by Douglas Whynott, a recent classic in boatbuilding literature.

Wood, Water & Light by Mendlowitz and White is now available for a mere pittance, not a cent of which, I'm sorry to say, is likely to end up in the hands of Mr. Mendlowitz, a situation I hope he forgives me for encouraging. However, it is entirely possible that whiling away some pleasant hours with dreams of sailing with serve to introduce you to his work, and make you into a fan. Anyway, that's the tack I'm taking.

Joel White is past care about coin, sorry to report.

____________

Mike

Comments

[Reg Paley]

Here in the UK the 'masters' of marine photography are the Beken bros. If you enjoy looking at superb pictures of craft in full sail the visit www.beken.co.uk !