A portrait of Felice Willat

on the arttoartpalettejournal.com

“Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we find it not.” Ralph Waldo Emerson

Works of beauty

To Felice Willat, photography is an invaluable tool in presenting the common denominator of beauty within a world too far divided. Her travels have provided a closer view of our neighbors that inhabit seemingly strange places to most. Felice has made it her life to capture the essence of beauty through the realism of countries foreign and uncomfortable to us, presenting a view that moves us closer to their lives.

Willat began her interest in photography and far away lands in 1989 when she attended the Kumbh Mela in India. Her tourist front quickly faded as she sat in a small boat, surrounded by a group of pilgrims, women and children, on the way to the sacred waters. The small camera that kept her distance from the natives suddenly stopped working and she found herself face-to-face with strange people in a strange land. Forcing herself to look around and mingle with the foreigners, Felice began to blend in with the sameness of a world that suddenly, was not that far divided.

Returning home, Felice couldn’t stop thinking about the people halfway across the world and studied her photos carefully, seeing the scenes in an entirely different life. It was then that photography became her life. Studying with Claire Steinberg on the elements of the design in photography, a discovery of how color, space, form and texture could portray feeling to lives that many have never known. David Skernick was also a leading figure for Felice in the digital world of technology, one that she continues to work with today.

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