Photographing wilderness
‍As a felt Experience

Meredith Austin Fontana is a Denver-based fine art landscape photographer whose work explores wilderness character, natural history, and the felt experience of being immersed in wild places.

Before turning her focus fully toward photography, Meredith spent more than a decade as a paleontologist, studying the evolution of ancient lizards and the geologic history of Earth.

She holds an undergraduate degree in evolutionary biology from The University of Texas at Austin and a graduate degree in evolutionary biology from The George Washington University. Meredith is a published scientist and has conducted research with leading scientific institutions across the United States, including the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, the Field Museum, the Texas Science & Natural History Museum, the Houston Museum of Natural Science, the National Park Service, the Beaureau of Land Management.

That scientific background continues to shape her approach to photography. Meredith sees the landscape not simply as scenery, but as a record of ancient ecosystems, geologic processes, shifting climates, and the slow forces that continue to shape the natural world.

Most of her photographic work is made far from roads, overlooks, and easily accessible viewpoints. Through long hikes, backpacking expeditions, and days spent living off the land in remote backcountry locations, Meredith seeks out landscapes that require time, effort, and patience to understand.

The intense physical challenge of hiking through these places is central to the work itself. Her photographs are not made from brief encounters with the landscape, but from complete immersion.