Shining light

Photos By Ewen Bell

Ewen Bell's first photographic exhibition took place in a small gallery in Melbourne when he was 19 years old. The collection revealed images of salt lakes, farming machinery and gum leaves in fine detail. Not a lot has changed after two decades of shooting, although he says the cameras have gotten bigger and the world has gotten smaller. Travel is at the heart of Ewen’s photographic themes – he has spent his career on the road instead of in the studio. “Travel is really about people,” he says. “There’s no landscape that won’t take on extra meaning when you look closely at the relationship people have with it.” Much of Ewen’s travel these days revolves around sharing his knowledge with other photographers. He is based in Melbourne but every year he crosses the country from end to end several times, searching out remote coastline, hospitable towns and dusty tracks. His speciality is to pause and contemplate the little things that are often overlooked, such as gum leaves. “I can’t believe how lucky I am to have spent so much time travelling across this land,” he says. “I keep wondering if one day I’ll start to run out of new things to explore in Australia, but it hasn’t happened yet.”