I came to filmmaking late in life. For years my professional world was divided among business, publishing, and writing, while my life’s partner Mary quietly continued the work she had been doing for decades—photographing and documenting the emotional architecture of family, community, immigration, race, marriage, birth, adoption, and belonging.

As we entered our sixth decade together, I realized that her whole body of work had never been gathered into a single narrative. The photographs existed. The books existed. The journals existed. But the deeper story—the continuity of more than fifty years of observation—remained unseen. This film grew out of a desire to explore and preserve the evolution of that creative vision. What emerged was the story of a photographer’s career, and the development of her particular way of looking at the world. Across different subjects and circumstances, Mary would return to the same questions: What holds people together? What happens when those connections are tested or broken? Who is seen and who remains unseen? And what does it mean to belong?

In making Seeking the Light, I came to understand more clearly something that had always been present in Mary’s work. Her photography begins with curiosity but depends upon her willingness to look, listen, and remain with another person long enough for trust and understanding to emerge. As a first-time filmmaker in my seventies, I needed to learn the language and technology of a new medium. I decided to enlist emerging filmmaker Abigail Salmon, whose perspective and fluency in today’s filmmaking was a counterpoint to my knowledge of Mary and her work. Together, we chose not to create a conventional biographical documentary, but something more reflective and personal.

Our hope is that audiences leave the film thinking not just about photography, but also about paying attention—and about the connections between people, families, and communities that can be seen when we slow down long enough to really look.  -- DGK