It All Came Together

New York and San Francisco 1945-1946

Meyer Shapiro and his approach to art history struck home. Ann Armstrong loaned me the Wolfflin Principles of Art History. The Newhalls guided and became fast friends. Stieglitz was met! That lump of creativeness and spirituality broke out of its poured concrete straight jacket.

"Have you ever been in love?"

Yes.

"Then you can photograph."

 ...

The teaching job at California School of Fine Arts became available, the Newhalls recommended me to Ansel and I appeared in SF on my birthday, 1946.

All the background of science, art, teaching, photographing, living with people, writing, traveling was suddenly channeled into teaching at CSFA. I felt that I did not know enough.

The lessons learned from the Boleslavsky went into effect. The principles of art history were converted to use by photographers; the psychological approach learned from Shapiro went into effect, the idea of the equivalent from Stieglitz went into the curriculum; technique was learned from Ansel at a high rate of speed and his Zone System became my staple.

...

I taught five days and three nights a week for the first two years. There was little time to see the city ... I got to know the city from student's pictures. The first shooting of my own was a kind of compulsion to work at Land's End. Illustrations to fit the Amputations verses as equivalents was the first bite into serious photographing since Oregon.

Minor White, Memorable Fancies
edited by Todd Cronnan and Peter Bunnell (2025)

Larry Wolf, On My Birthday - Flight to San Francisco (1974)