Meet Shara Johnson | Writer & Photographer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Shara Johnson and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Shara, why did you pursue a creative career?
I guess the most honest answer is that I couldn’t not pursue writing and photography. I’ve been drawn to writing for as long as I can remember. Even in second grade, we had an assignment to write a biography for a class booklet, and were given a 6″x8″ piece of paper to fill. Some kids wrote a couple sentences. Some kids filled the page. I was the only kid who wrote two pages. From sixth grade through high school I wrote my own magazine. It was mostly factual articles (thanks to our full Encyclopedia set), with a little bit of silly fiction thrown in. What was the magazine’s circulation? Two. My mom and my dad. I spent hours upon hours researching articles and typing them up on the electric typewriter. It didn’t make me rich or famous, it just made me a nerd, but I couldn’t help myself — I can’t not write.

Decades later I’ve watched a similar phenomenon evolve with photography, I’m always thinking about how I’d like to capture this or that in a photo. If you ask me to leave my warm house on a cold winter morning to run an errand, I will fuss and complain how cold it is and how cozy I am inside. But if I spy a moose or a pretty bird or the sunlight hitting the snow at the perfect angle, I’m out the door in a flash with my camera, I may not even remember to put a coat on. A fair amount of wildlife passes through our yard, so it’s not that I want to be out in the cold, I just can’t help myself chasing or patiently waiting for the photo I want.

So when I get to travel, which is the most fulfilling activity for me, naturally I am compelled to document my experiences in word and picture, which is why I started my travel blog. And because my husband and I spend so much time exploring our area mostly by 4×4 roads, I find myself always thinking about how this or that spot would be a nice place to show other writers for inspiration or just for fresh air … I know a lot of writers who live in cities and apartments pine just for some quiet space and fresh air to write in, so my new venture of establishing Black Bear Writing Retreat is once again something that is more of a compulsion than a choice. I have a lot of anxieties about whether it will be successful but I can’t not give it a try.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
While I don’t use any special or unique techniques in photography, if anything sets me apart it’s simply the subject matter, in that I’ve been able to travel to a lot of places many people have never been (for example, Antarctica and Iran). When I hang exhibits at the Boulder Rec Centers each year, I don’t think I’ve ever hung up and taken down my photos without people stopping to ask me about the photos and about the places they were taken. I always welcome the opportunity to share with others some of the amazing pockets of the planet I’ve seen, and I try to represent a minimum of five different countries in each exhibit (with Colorado usually representing for USA).

Because of the volunteer and research projects I’ve taken part in (this is when I travel solo), I’ve been able to travel to places where Westerners had never been seen before, to live in indigenous communities not accessible to tourists, and meet some extremely interesting people. This makes a lot of my writing unique in that very few other people could write nonfiction about similar experiences.

I think the most important thing I’ve learned is something my dad said he learned from his own dad: not to be afraid to try something new. Though for me, it’s truncated a bit to simply, “Don’t be afraid to try.” Not everything pans out. Rejection sucks but rejection or failure is often part of the trying process, and you take it in stride, learn what you can from it and keep on. If an idea keeps nagging at you, you will likely regret it down the road if you never even try to follow through on the idea. It might not work out successfully, but you will be free of the regret that you didn’t try and of wondering what would have happened if you did.

A current case in point for me is striking out this year to establish a writing retreat I’ve been mulling over the last few years since I held a “beta” retreat to get feedback from some trial participants, which ended up being very positive. Black Bear Writing Retreat will be unique in providing participants with a combination of quiet writing time and creative writing exercises alongside sightseeing adventures with me as the private tour guide in the mountains around Nederland. I’m stressed about whether people will sign up, but I will kick myself if I don’t put it out there and give it a try. I’ve scheduled one for this summer (2023) July 19-25.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
My area of expertise is west of Denver in the mountains above Boulder, but if my friend came to Denver I would book us tickets to Meow Wolf (and go on a weekday in the morning) and to the Denver Art Museum. I’d also recommend the Denver Museum of Natural History, but I guess I’m kind of a museum nerd. We would go for drinks at Pints Pub. If a friend was in town on the last Monday of a month, I’d take them to Freak Train at the Bug Theater. And if they were so inclined they could also sign up for a 5-minute slot to perform (absolutely anything) on stage. We’d go early before the show starts and hit some of the small art galleries near the theater.

I would take them on a day trip or two into the mountains, as well, instead of only looking at them from the Front Range! Daytrip #1: A lot of people are interested in Boulder, we could swing through Boulder in the morning on the way up to Nederland, where we’d first take a spin on the very unique Carousel of Happiness. Depending on my friend’s disposition and the weather, we could select one of many hikes in the area — my favorite to show guests is Caribou Ranch Open Space — or just drive along the scenic Peak to Peak Highway. We’d have a happy hour beer at Very Nice Brewery.

Daytrip #2: I’m not really a fan of the actual gambling there, but Central City, 35 miles west of Denver, is still a very historic town, founded in 1859. I’d pick up a self-guided walking tour brochure at the visitor’s center and regale my friend with our state’s mining heritage in the beautiful mountains. We’d have beer and pizza at Dostal Alley. I’d recommend they visit in the summer so we could attend the Stills in the Hills distillery festival or the Central City beer festival, both featuring only Colorado brewers and distillers.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
With my photography, I was blessed to have such a generous mother-in-law, even though, sadly, she passed in 2021. She was a well-known local artist, D.J. Donovan-Johnson, and she built a huge, gorgeous art studio in her home complete with framing supplies and equipment. She offered me free access to all of her supplies and my husband knows how to cut glass and mats, so I got off the ground selling framed photography because of her generosity (and my husband’s kind help); I never would have had the capital to pay for it all myself. I was always grateful, but now that I’ve had to learn how much outside framing services cost, my gratitude has leveled up even more for those years of free framing.

Never short on inspiration with my writing, it’s in the “perspiration” I often feel lost. If I may just give a shout-out to two fantastic local writers (their books are on the shelves!) whose generosity in sharing with me their time, knowledge and experience in a variety of writing arenas has gone above and beyond: David Hicks and Debra Bokur. They have been mentors in a way, and most any essay I get published has one of their hands behind the scenes providing advice.

Website: http://blackbearretreat.com / https://skjphotography.net / https://skjtravel.net / https://sharasinor.com

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