Contemporary Photographer Series - Ben Huff

 from the series The Last Road North © Ben Huff

Ben Huff is a photographer and professor who lives in Juneau, Alaska. His project, The Last Road North, took 5 years to complete and consists of images all shot on a 4x5 film camera along Alaska's Dalton Highway. Huff has traveled hundreds of miles to capture a unique series of images that gives light to the relationship between wilderness and industry along the highway. He was recently interviewed by Annie Buckles for our Contemporary Photographer Series (CPS).

Did you specifically move to Alaska to work on The Last Road North? What about Alaska and the Dalton Highway made you decide to spend such an extensive amount of time exploring the region?

My wife and I moved to Fairbanks in July 2005 for my wife to go to graduate school studying arctic chemistry. Initially, I was overwhelmed and challenged by the landscape, but ultimately confused by my new home. I would go out on the weekends, and the space was pure National Geographic stuff - hiking, rafting, skiing. But when I came home to Fairbanks, this dirty little town on the edge of nowhere, I had a really difficult time reconciling the two together. Making pure, sweeping landscapes felt disingenuous in a way. I wanted to badly not be a tourist. I wanted to see things clearly, and try to work out artistically, the dichotomy that interested me. Ultimately, the haul road became the backdrop that scratched that itch.

On your five-year journey across Alaska, I'm sure you encountered a variety of individuals. What drew you to the specific people you chose to photograph and how were you able to decide which portraits to include in your project?

In a way, I approached portraiture like I was casting for a film. I never wanted the work to be a documentary project - I was looking for something lyrical. So with the portraits I wanted a degree of melancholy. The project has a weight to it, and I wanted a look with the portraits that felt more regretful than celebratory. Not boom, but bust.

from the series The Last Road North © Ben Huff

The miles you traveled along the Dalton Highway must have felt quite intimidating and lonely. Did you ever wonder why you chose to partake in such a wild adventure or did you find yourself entranced in the experience?

I knew on my way home from my first trip up the road that it was a place that I would spend an exorbitant amount of time on. I could see it so clearly, and I wanted so much to make a contemporary portrait of the space, which spoke to the things I was struggling with. Each drive brought anxiety and excitement. As the work was largely self-funded, most times I'd come coasting back into town on fumes, exhausted and burnt. I wanted the work to reflect that.

from the series The Last Road North © Ben Huff

Would you consider relocating for a future project or do you think Alaska will provide you with enough content to create future work?

I'm here to stay. There are a hundred lifetimes worth of work to do in Alaska and I'm committed to making work here. I live with a constant anxiety that I'm not doing enough and there are drawbacks to living in Juneau, and Alaska in general, but the opportunity to make work here is something I try not to take for granted.

from the series The Last Road North © Ben Huff

Is there any specific advice you would give to young photographers starting out who are interested in creating a body of work while traveling on the open road?

Curiosity and diligence are everything. You're making something from nothing, and your unique viewpoint, quirks, intelligence, instincts, fears, work ethic - all of this is your foundation. Use it all. It all begins and ends with you.