Photo Essays

Arkansas and Missouri Railroad Photo Essay – Seeing the Ozarks from Ground Level (mostly)

We almost missed the Arkansas and Missouri Railroad train because Jennifer Carman and I were busy talking to shop owners. Jennifer is an art appraiser who studied in London and the author of the well-known book Arkansas Made Volume II, which has become a coffee table staple. By the time we boarded, my Canon 1DX Mark III battery was nearly dead, and I only had a 50mm lens. No backups and no plan B.

The train ride gave me a completely new vantage point of a route I have driven up and down since I was a teenager. Every bend in the tracks felt strange, seeing everything at ground level after all these years of only looking down on it from the highway. My battery light was flashing the whole time and Jennifer even pointed it out. I had to turn my camera on and off between shots to make it last. Every single frame counted.

I did not want to shoot the same old scenes that every photographer before me had. Instead, I focused on the towering overpasses and massive structures the train chugged beneath, which felt like another world from the ground.

The resulting photo essay of the Arkansas and Missouri Railroad captures the hidden details of Northwest Arkansas and the Ozarks in a way that driving the same roads for years never could.

 Watch the full reel from this Arkansas and Missouri Railroad train ride on my Instagram @katwilsonartist and see the journey unfold.