Dakota Clark, Postcards From Tasmania (LANDSCAPE 2025)

Earlier this year I took a break from life, I packed my car so I can car camp and go on a 6 month road trip around Australia. Little did I know my trip would have one destination, Tasmania. I took a break from the ever growing crushing reality living and working in Melbourne was doing to me. I went on my trip to re-align with myself, because somewhere along the way of growing my career, I lost the essence that was me. I looked in the mirror one day and couldn’t even recognise the person I had grown to become. So off I went on my trip, expecting to do a full lap of Australia, but I ended up staying in Tasmania for 3 months, where I am glad to say, reality hit me in all the best ways possible. I could finally hear myself think again, and for the first time in years I started taking photos as a way to ease my mind. Photography became a language between me and the world around me. A quiet conversation between two beings trying to capture the essence of what is happening to us. Through my photography, and my hikes throughout Tasmania, I began to listen to myself again. Tasmania didn’t just help me practice my photography, it didn’t just show me beautiful landscapes, it changes the way I viewed life, completely raw, rugged and full of unsurprising turns, it taught me that just because you take one out of focus image, doesn’t mean the entire day was ruined, it’s another chance to learn, to grow. While I didn’t go on my trip for nearly as along as I thought I was, nor did I see as much of Australia as I had planned. My main goal was to find myself again, and thankfully Tasmania gave me that, and my love of photography found me there too.

Images have been resized for web display, which may cause some loss of image quality. Note: Original high-resolution images are used for judging.