Eudora Welty (1909-2001) has been called the “Voice of the American South” for her proud celebration of her native state of Mississippi and its people in words and pictures. Though she is best known as an influential author—having won the 1973 Pulitzer Prize for her novel
The Optimist’s Daughter—she was also an accomplished photographer.

Welty was born in Jackson, Mississippi, where she spent most of her life. Growing up, her father was an avid amateur photographer who captured lively images of his family. Welty, along with some of her friends, also enjoyed taking playful snapshots of one another. Soon, she was making her own prints in a makeshift darkroom.

Beginning in the 1920s, Welty’s activities as a photographer and novelist complemented and enriched each other. During the 1930s, she worked as a photographer for Life magazine and traveled throughout rural areas of Mississippi as well as Louisiana for the Works Progress Administration (WPA). Her photographs were not published until almost 40 years later in the book One Time, One Place: Mississippi in the Depression.

Welty was one of the most compassionate observers of her time. She said of her work:
“My wish, indeed my continuing passion, would be not to point the finger in judgment but to part a curtain, that invisible shadow that falls between people, the veil of indifference to each other’s presence, each other’s wonder, each other’s human plight.”

This exhibition is organized by the Mississippi Museum of Art, Jackson, Mississippi, and circulated by International Arts & Artists, Inc., Washington, D.C. Presentation at NMWA is made possible through the Mississippi State Committee of the National Museum of Women in the Arts.