On the Cover: Witt Duncan

Witt Duncan and I had a short window for our phone interview to discuss his Painted Churches of Texas photographs (which can be found on this issue’s cover and illustrating Rebecca Clark’s “My Blue Heaven” on page 65)—for the traveling photographer, time, more specifically the sun’s position, is precious—but he missed my first call. He called back with a good reason for not picking up: he had been trying to befriend a stray. Perched on the bumper of his car in Monument Valley, having just captured the sunrise, Duncan was proffering bits of his breakfast to a standoffish Navajo dog. Dollops of oatmeal seemed to have done the trick.

Currently Duncan, an Austin native, is on the road. The bulk of his and his girlfriend’s material possessions are in storage, and they have plans to move from Texas to the West Coast in early 2018, but until then they are untethered. “These recent travels have been prompted by a feeling that I needed to catch up for lost time,” said Duncan, who quit a Houston office job after nearly six years to travel Asia for nine months with his girlfriend; the pair saw eight countries in total. “More and more, as we traveled, our mantra changed to ‘More time, fewer places,’” said Duncan. “You get a better feeling for the place; you absorb it and realize what makes it tick.” 

He caught the travel bug from his grandmother, who “would arrange these grand trips for us. I was fortunate enough to see other sides of the world at a young age.” But he did not see inside the painted churches, just a short drive from his family’s ranch in Swiss Alp, Texas, until he was an adult. One Sunday, on a whim, he took his camera on a drive to three Czech churches in Fayette County.

In his vivid photographs, Duncan captures the otherness of the churches in both wide, craning angles and sharp detail shots. The Czech and German immigrants who crafted these monumental buildings aimed high for grandeur; the churches, with their enduring air of reverence, marry Old World traditions to the heady relief of American prosperity.

“Traveling in different countries for the better part of year has heightened my awareness for how good we’ve got it back here at home,” said Duncan. “It’s raised my appreciation for the smallest things: clean streets, quietness, simple things that are not the norm in other places.”

But he’s wary of luxury. “One of the big takeaways is that the happiest people I’ve met—the most fulfilled—had the fewest material possessions,” said Duncan. “That’s why I’m trying to downsize, to focus on people, relationships, and experiences.”

See more of Duncan’s work at wittduncan.com.