Ice floating in a dark pool at dusk in mid-January at White Pocket, a wilderness location of exceptional geological variety and beauty in Vermillion Cliffs National Monument in Arizona close to the Utah border. It takes 3-4 hours of driving over dirt, mud, and sand roads to reach the parking area, where one must stay over night to catch the sunset and dawn.

About Joel Simpson:

A NJ native, with a PhD from Brown in comparative literature, Simpson went pro as a photographer in 2002, after teaching college English, French, and Italian, and playing jazz piano professionally in New Orleans. Since then, his work has shown extensively in solo and group shows in the US and Europe, been published many times, and has won awards, and is part of the permanent collections at the Paris Musée de l’érotisme and the Williamsburg (Brooklyn) Art and Historical Center. His book of geological photography, EARTHFORMS: Intimate Portraits of Our Planet, won a GOLD Nautilus Book Award for 2019. earthforms.net