Life in the Woods (in the 21st Century)
Photography
2017
My poppy portrait of Henry David Thoreau.
On my second trip to the USA, I visited Walden Pond, where Thoreau lived in a cabin and developed his influential book "Walden - Life in the Woods". Like any place that becomes a tourist attraction, the Pond and his visitor centre are just a kind of hollow image of the idea that once might have been there, and funnily enough, the reconstructed cabin is now situated right next to the car park.
What fascinated me was that although he was retreating to the nature at Walden pond, he was also an inventor with patents and regularly met with others to discuss social themes. And of course, the anecdote that he could always walk home to his mother's house to wash his clothes.