This feature forms part of our photographic encourage anyone with interest essay series. showcasing the role photographers play in our relationships with and perception of, this country we all call home.

“Probably now more than ever I see a photograph as a memory. One one-thousandth of a second of my life caught on film. A fleeting moment that I look back at and feel every sense and emotion from that point in time.”

Annie Montgomery, a twenty-eight-year-old originally from North East Victoria, has been living in the Kimberley for the last four and a half years – working predominantly on stations and contract camps.

Having lost her job as a heavy diesel apprentice, Annie left Victoria at the start of Covid. She took a job in Western Australia as a station hand, not knowing that about halfway through the drive across the country WA would shut its borders. Effectively leaving Annie shut in Western Australia for the next three years.

Annie feels she’s a better person for being where she’s been, with the people she’s been with, living under the guidance of the people she’s been working for. Annie’s experiences in the remote WA have shed her skin and she feels like she’s become someone new, someone she’s proud to be and grateful to have been moulded into.

At the end of the day, Annie admits she is just a girl with a big heart – often feeling like she really has no idea what she’s doing, but continuing to have faith in following her heart and hoping her happiness can’t lead her anywhere disastrous.

“Probably now more than ever I see a photograph as a memory. One one-thousandth of a second of my life caught on film. A fleeting moment that I look back at and feel every sense

and emotion from that point in time. The photographs I take are the story of my life. They began as an opportunity to capture that for my parents who have never seen the West. The main camera I use was my fathers, which I took out of nostalgia and a sense of closeness to him. It’s a 1980 Pentax ME super which he bought in Jackson, Wyoming when he was about my age. I mail all the rolled of film to my mother, who takes them into a family-owned camera house in Albury where she delights in telling the staff what I’ve been up to and what this roll of film may be.

“Photography is an opportunity to share your perception of the world, and in turn, to broaden
other people’s perception of it. The amount of feedback I get about the scenes I’ve been lucky
enough to capture and the beauty others find in them makes me appreciate my life and the
opportunities I get so much. I believe it also encourages others to seek out this life. The West will always be here, the North will always be here, and I thoroughly encourage anyone with interest to take the reins and see it for themselves.

“Please remember that life is precious and potentially fleeting, so take every opportunity and make the most of it all. I am blessed with a lot of amazing people in my life, really supportive friends whose homes are always open, who care about each other and come together for each other. For that, I’m probably one of the richest people in the world.”

If you’re interested in seeing more of our work - we hope you’ll consider subscribing to our physical paper here.