For more than thirty years now I have been travelling the world writing and photographing for some of the world’s great publications. For the past twenty of those years much of my work has been for the National Geographic Society, where I have been a regular and frequent and award-winning contributor to National Geographic Magazine as well as to its sister publications, National Geographic Traveller and National Geographic Adventure, and contributed features to National Geographic on-line. I have written or contributed to several “coffee table” books for National Geographic’s book division on subjects ranging from great railway journeys of the world to the history of photography at National Geographic. I wrote National Geographic Travellers guidebook to Australia and have written two travel books (both published by National Geographic Adventure Press) One was Cold Beer and Crocodiles, about a 10,000-mile solo bicycle expedition I made through the Australian outback that was also a three-part series in the magazine, another – Life on The Ice – about my travels in Antarctica. I have also given lectures for the Society, taught travel writing and photography workshops on cruise ships and led more than thirty National Geographic-themed tours in places as diverse as Antarctica, New Zealand, Britain, Scandinavia and the Baltic States and South America.
I remain a contracted photographer with National Geographic Creative. My work has appeared in Time, Newsweek, Nature, NPR’s website, Conde Nast Traveller, Islands Magazine, Smithsonian, and Lonely Planet Traveller. Corporate clients include Coca-Cola and Toyota.
My work has taken me to every continent and to more than 100 countries. I am an accomplished expedition cyclist and have done extended solo treks in Australia, the US, Africa, across Europe, the length and breadth of Great Britain and, in a light hearted moment, ‘around the world’ in under ten seconds while on a National Geographic assignment at the South Pole in the summer of 2000.
http://www.roffsmithphotography.com/about/
Travels at Home
Every morning I set off on a journey, up at sparrows and down the street on my bicycle, exercising my imagination as much as my legs. By the time I return to the house an hour or two later, having witnessed the sunrise and put however many miles of town and country beneath my wheels, I feel as though I have been places, seen things, travelled in the grand old sense of the word. To that end I bring along my camera and tripod and record these journeys as though they were travel stories, celebrating the freedoms and simple joy of a bicycle ride and the marvels of travelling at home. I find myself seeing with new eyes and delighting in the discovery that you don’t need to hop on a plane to experience a sense of wonder or the romance of difference. It’s right on my doorstep. And on yours too, if you look.
-Roff Smith, http://www.theartoftheride.com
I first saw the work on Roff Smith in a New York Times article that I was sent by a friend who thought I might like to have a look at it. I was instantly drawn into this body of work and could see the relevance in digging deeper into what the body of work was about. During the first lockdown and the beginning of the pandemic, I struggled to work in a creative way. Looking at Smith’s work that he created during this period of time it gave me some time to reflect on this period of time. It was about a year ago when we were all locked up in our houses and told that we could only leave once a day for daily exercise. I did this everyday, my brother and I would go for daily walks and I would quite often take my camera and snap a few photographs. However, I had very little direction with that work that I was making and nothing really came from the work that I made.
I gather a sense of reflection from Smith's body of work. A time where he has explored his home area and captured it in a dream-like way. Getting up at the crack of dawn to catch the sunrise, a moment in the day which not many of us get up every morning to witness. The thick green trees with a splash of warm sunlight bring a sense of optimism and hope to the journey that he is on. The solitude is uniformed in every frame as it is only Smith and his bicycle in the photograph which connects the viewer to Smith’s lockdown journey.
A self portrait is also a self reflection, something that photographers do in many forms through their work. Smith, his bicycle and his camera. A three way relationship that allows him to explore, exercise and create which is a photographic practice that I relate to. I think there is a strong connection between a photographer and something that they love. For me, lots of my work is made when I am out wandering across the land, something that is innate to me. This is the same kind of relationship that I am feeling that Smith has with cycling and photography. I think it is clear in the text, that going out cycling and taking photographs help Smith to get through the bored times of the first lockdown. A passion and activity that he was able to carry on through a tough time for all.
This is one of my favorite photographs from this series of images. The sunlight that is falling through the trees is perfecting landing on Smith as he cycles through this country lane. The light instantly draws the viewer into the center of the photograph, while the natural vignette tunnel created by the trees contains the eyes of the viewer on Smith him.
The simpleness of the composition gives the viewer time to reflect on smith's relationship with the space that he is currently travelling through. Early in the morning, perhaps at the beginning of spring when the green trees are looking most alive and fresh. While also looking relatively small in the space that he is travelling through which emphasizes the beauty and power that the green space may have on the way in which Smith's views the land.
The short piece of road also makes me think about the journey they have been on to get there as well as the future journey he will embark on. It's a reflective yet forward thinking photograph which visually describes the present. Photographing the present and conveying the present I think are two separate things. In photography we are constantly photographing the present, however, not all photographs bring the viewer into the present moment that the photographer experienced when making the photograph. I believe that Smith has done this by capturing himself travelling through the landscape. A self portrait visually connects the viewer to the photographer them self by capturing themselves in the moment that they are experiencing.