The Story of Ascension.

I traveled a thousand miles south to this desert cathedral. I had my sights set on Eureka Dune, but the desert had its own plans. A washout cut the path, a gash in the earth. I was alone, miles from any other human being, beyond the reach of any signal, with only silence and instinct to guide me.

As I stood there assessing the situation, I looked up and saw a single snowflake falling from a pale sky. I put out my hand and it landed on the tip of my finger. I instantly knew that I must turn back and let go. 

2 days later, I found myself at Dumont Dune. I wandered its shifting sands, watching the light and following the shadows as they drifted over the ridges, accompanied only by wind, sun, moon, and my own footsteps. In some sense I was searching for the perfect vantage point, but really I was just feeling. Connecting with the desert around me.

“I want to be like you, able to reach every corner of the world, to know the world’s secrets, and to carry the voices of the desert and the souls of the wind.” The Alchemist

It was time. I had come to the desert to become the light, this I knew.  The night before my ascent, I conducted a trial, a quiet ritual at the dune’s base. I set my camera in position, opened the shutter, and stepped into the frame. I imagined myself as more energy than matter, scattering small bursts of light into the darkness. My camera gathered these moments, weaving them into a single vision. The lens became an extension of my own body, a mirror to my awareness, a loop between seer and seen.

Harnessed.

Collect

On the final day, I found my vantage point. I captured the icy clouds gliding above and the sheen of the sunlit sand. I waited and watched for hours as the sun fell. I programmed the camera to capture a sequence of thirty-second exposures. Then I entered the darkness and began to ascend the dune in front of me.

Every three steps, I released a flash—each burst recorded in the sensor’s memory, each one a marker of my steady progress. My light traced a path over the dune’s back, a line of ascent. Step after step, I rose, until at last I reached the crest. I congratulated myself and gave thanks.

The Acension of Dumont Dune.

Collect

When I returned to my camera and closed the shutter, something rare unfolded: a lunar corona. Millions of suspended hexagonal ice particles caught the full moon’s light, refracting it into a spectral halo. A rainbow ring encircled the moon at the twenty-first hour, and I stood in stillness. The moon, wrapped in its halo, gave thanks in return as if just for me. I was humbled.

Lunar Halo.

Collect

The final image, The Ascension of Dumont Dune, is a composite of seven exposures—two from the day, five from the night—woven together to dissolve the edges of time. It is, to me, the representation of the ideal journey from point A to point B, from earth to sky, with no rush, no shortcuts. Steady steps, small bursts of light, leading to evolutionary leaps. A quiet reminder to both you and I that the journey itself is its own raison d'être.