Ellen Warner | The Second Half: Forty Women Reveal Life After Fifty

Over the course of 15 years, Ellen Warner interviewed and photographed women from different cultures about life after age 50 — from an author and translator in Connecticut to a sacred healer in Indonesia, a doctor in Saudi Arabia, a retired cook in Antigua, and the first French woman TV anchor.

The Second Half presents Warner’s analog black and white photographs accompanied by excerpts of the women’s interviews. Intimate and frank, Warner’s portraits reflect the aesthetics, traditions, and landscapes of their subjects’ environments —gnarled apple trees, bookshelves, gilded mirrors, stucco city blocks — and the histories they hold. Spanning decades and cultures, Warner’s portraits and interviews celebrate the wisdom, resiliency, and joy of women in their second half of life.

The exhibition is presented by the Women’s Studies Research Center at Brandeis, with co-sponsorship by the Brandeis University Press.