Daniel King’s road trip from New Jersey to Upstate New York: his images endure
Late photographer Daniel King’s work stands as a document of his approach: quiet, exact, wide open. The road trip wasn’t about reaching a destination
Daniel King
Born in Sydney, Daniel King began shooting surf photography as a teenager, drawn to speed, instinct, and light. Over time, his practice expanded into fashion and portraiture, with campaigns for major brands and editorial work in Europe and the US. Yet his personal work always circled back to story—Ukraine, youth, urban quiet, marginal spaces. His photographs hold distance without detachment. He didn’t dramatize, didn’t decorate. He paid attention.
In loving memory of Daniel King. His images endure—quiet, exact, and wide open.
From New Jersey to Upstate New York: a Visual Road Trip Story by Daniel King
From the edge of New Jersey to the forests of Upstate New York, photographer Daniel King and artist Laura Morgan took to the road with no crew, no schedule, no plan beyond attention. What began as a fashion shoot quickly became something else—a stripped-down exercise in shared authorship, shaped by instinct, proximity, and terrain.
They stopped where the landscape shifted. Motels, empty lots, river towns, roadside debris. Morgan moved through these spaces—kneeling in grass, leaning against concrete, folding into the shapes of fallen trees and rusted steel. King photographed with clarity and patience, treating each frame as a scene, not a composition. The result is a narrative sequence that blurs documentary, cinema, and performance.
Created for Lampoon Issue 2 in 2021, this editorial was one of King’s last independent projects before his death. It stands as a document of his approach: quiet, unsentimental, exacting. The work resists production and polish. There are no forced gestures, no elaborate sets. Instead, the landscape leads. Each image holds the trace of weather, fatigue, movement, and shared time.
Morgan brought elements from her personal archive—clothing, references, fragments of past work—which layered the visual story with memory and texture. The two navigated direction and styling together. Roles dissolved. The camera became a witness rather than a tool for control.
Their collaboration unfolded across a familiar stretch of American Northeast—one that shifts from suburban decay to wooded stillness, from river towns to concrete margins. But here, the route is not scenic; it’s emotional. Each location reveals itself through stillness, not spectacle. A parking lot becomes a stage. A pile of branches becomes choreography.
