Sean Neilson

The summer after Sean graduated from college, he waited tables in Yellowstone to delay entering “the real world.” It was there, surrounded by the beauty of such a special place, that he realized the natural world was the real world, and it had captured him. Several years and a second degree later, Sean found himself helping visitors with their bird lists rather than their menu selections as a ranger with the National Park Service. After several adventure-filled years at Yellowstone, he sought an even bigger and wilder landscape in Glacier Bay, Alaska. For the next 15 years, Sean worked as a ranger and naturalist for Glacier Bay National Park.

While working in Southeast Alaska, Sean put down roots in the small bush community of Gustavus, adjacent to Glacier Bay. He built a handcrafted home where he lives with his wife and two children. Sharing the natural world with his family and others fits naturally with their subsistence lifestyle. Whether hunting deer, fishing for halibut and salmon, tending the garden or gathering mushrooms and berries, Sean spends as much time as possible outside in the wet and wild country of Glacier Bay and Icy Strait.

At home, Sean stays busy fixing things his kids break. Photography provides another way for him to share the beauty of the natural world while giving him an outlet for creative expression.