Photographer and writer William Guion has photographed the landscape and live oak trees of Louisiana and the South for more than 40 years. His goal is to help preserve Southern live oaks by showing the importance of the this tree species as an essential part of the history, culture, and ecology of the South.

His writings and photographs about oaks have appeared in numerous publications like American Forests, Louisiana Life, and Country Roads magazines, the Journal of the International Oak Society, the Baton Rouge Sunday Advocate magazine, Under the Oaks magazine (a publication of the Newcomb College of Arts), Creation Spirituality magazine, and books like Live Oak Lore by Ethelyn Orso, Spiritual Literacy by Frederick and Mary Ann Brussat, and Folklife in Louisiana through Photography by Frank DeCaro. Return to Heartwood is his 6th book.

Guion’s images are contained in a variety of corporate and private collections across the country as well as the public collections of the Louisiana Folklife Museum, the Louisiana State Museum, and the New Orleans Museum of Art. His photographs have been used for several book jacket covers (for Simon and Schuster, Random House, Crown Books, Harper Collins, and Warner Books) and in the feature film (The Wishing Tree starring Alfre Woodard, 1999).