My default has always been to post photos to Instagram—it’s the quickest way to get images in front of an audience and receive real-time feedback and potential work opportunities. It’s a necessary tool for my job, but it’s not my favorite way to share images. If it were up to me, I would print all my favorite images from a shoot and have a studio space where people could stop by to check out my recent projects and discuss photography. It’s a future dream—hopefully, a reality one day.
For now, I’m here behind my cluttered desk, a victim of my undiagnosed ADHD, trying to write something that my partner, Julia, won’t tear apart later—before I get to the fun part of curating these images and uploading them to my site (lol).
One of the perks of my career is travel. I rarely say no to a travel assignment, even if it means braving the -30°C winter of the Northwest Territories to capture the Aurora Borealis. An article will be coming out in September in Qantas Airlines’ in-flight magazine, but I took a little side quest on that shoot to capture images of a houseboat community living in the political gray area of lawless land—just a stone’s throw from the city of Yellowknife. I didn’t get to learn much about the people who inhabit these houseboats, but from my understanding, it’s somewhat of a protest against the lack of housing options in the city. Pat Kane did a great photo series for Vice that provides more depth to the community, which you can check out [here].
I’ve always been drawn to the off-grid lifestyle—not because I necessarily want to live that way, but because I’m curious about the people who do. There’s something compelling about those who choose to exist outside the conventional systems, carving out their own space in the world. I was hoping to meet some of these people on my walk, but clearly winter is not the optimal time to catch people wandering around on the frozen lake.
Bombay Beach, CA
The landscape felt almost familiar as I walked across the frozen lake. Each houseboat was a world of its own, with its own quirks and personality. Some were adorned with bright colors, others with hand-built additions that seemed to defy engineering logic. Every detail—makeshift docks frozen in place, smoke curling from wood stoves, personal artifacts scattered across the ice—made me want to know more about the lives being lived here. Looking back at these images, I realized this scene reminded me of Bombay Beach, California, a place I have been drawn to and have photographed many times. Though the two landscapes are polar opposites in temperature, they share a similar atmosphere—harsh and hostile at first glance yet open to a curious traveller if you’re willing to look deeper.
Written by Shayd Johnson, edited by Julia Crawford & Chat GPT