Isolation

How did Isolation start?

The series started in Devil's Garden, at the back end of Arches National Park. I got a shot of a guy just standing up on a rock formation, no one else around, on his phone. There was a feeling that came with that. I get it sometimes when I'm out by myself shooting landscapes, or walking through a city surrounded by people and still on my own. So this collection is shots that capture that emotion. I wanted each one to convey what I was feeling in the moment I took it, or how I'd feel if I were the person in the photo. Sonder, applied to the subject.

Is it about being alone, or about noticing that someone else is?

Well, that's just it, isn't it? Is their life as full as mine? Is mine as full as theirs? They're a single person out in the middle of nowhere, same as I am. Why?

The man in that first photograph is looking at his phone.

I kind of have to forgive the phone. Given the location, I bet he was just up there trying to get a signal.

Is being alone in a city the same feeling as being alone in the desert?

Alone in the city is such a different beast. Out in the middle of nowhere, you know you are. But alone in a city, especially somewhere you don't live, where you're a complete stranger, the only relationships you really have are with restaurant workers, street vendors, the hotel concierge maybe. It's easier than ever now to move through a city full of people and talk to no one. I think most days, people live their lives that way: buried in their phone, a head full of social media, moving through millions of people with no social contact. That's hard. It's hard to live a life like that, and I think it's affecting all of us.

What gets cut from a series like this?

It's really the opposite of cutting things. I've never removed a shot from this collection. It's very hard for me to put one in. Each one is from such a different time and place as I've travelled around, and I kind of happen onto them. They're as much a discovery for me as they are for anyone else. I really have to find them, and sometimes I find them in other photographs. I could finish a walk through whatever city I was in and not even have caught the photo when I took it, but going back through it later, I'll run across it, and that emotion will hit me when I see it.