Stories tell us who we are.

I’m sure the stories your parents told you helped define your sense of self. I know mine did.

My father especially, was a great story teller. I can see him now, through the back seat window of the Holden, elbow on a fence post, cigarette in hand waving trails of smoke about in ven diagrams, explaining the comings and goings and hilarious behaviour of some rascal.

Laughter and a gentle shake of the head, kicking the mud off a work book then pointing off into some distant imagined bar room or shearing shed. More laughter, a hand shake and a cheery goodbye. That was his fuel - warm, non-partisan conversation.

These childhood observations of my father’s social interactions - his yarning - taught me how to tell stories in my life. Not leaning on a fence post but quietly navigating an environment I had been invited into, understanding my roll as observer and the task of capturing and retelling the story I was observing with wonder, empathy and curiosity. Always thinking about how it will be read by unknown eyes sometime in the future.

Working as a travelling editorial photographer is about putting yourself second. I know it’s the opposite of what we seem to be obsessed with now - putting ourselves at the centre of everything - but to truly tell a story and to allow others to understand that story, you really need to think about the story first and the self second - or preferably - not at all.

This photograph, taken in a remote village on one of the smaller outer islands of Vanuatu describes the sentiment of quiet observation. It’s a picture about a life that is being lived in perfect harmony with the environment. A subsistence fisherman - one spear, a powerful physique and an empty horizon.