The Luxury Travel Magazine
The Luxury Travel Magazine
On loneliness, Carl Jung wrote: “Loneliness does not come from having no people around you, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to you.” One of the world’s most revered golf course photographers, Gary Lisbon, has always worked alone. It is at these welcomed moments of solitude faced with the elements and with only his camera equipment in tow, that he achieves the most epic pictures imaginable. After all, Jung did say: “ … only in the state of complete abandonment and loneliness, we experience the helpful powers of our own natures”. If these photos are a reflection of his true nature, then his inner landscape is something to aspire to.
Gary Lisbon is a modest, genial fellow; a keen golfer with a calm disposition, someone who seems to embody the idea of zen. His photographs, however, are a sensory overload. So captivating that at a glance, everything in the room falls away, for you can not only see, but hear, feel, touch, taste and smell the golf courses he photographs. It’s for this reason that he now has influencer status with over 40k Instagram followers since starting his account six years ago and it’s worth noting this is in an industry which attracts an overall older social media following.
Living in Melbourne, Australia and choosing to live in a home with a garden that backs onto Royal Melbourne Golf Club, one of the most prestigious courses in the city, it’s obvious that other than his family, golf is beyond a passion. Gary’s career has seen many incarnations. He started out his working life as an accountant – “the world’s worst auditor”- until one day he took on a local client, Kingston Heath Golf Club in Melbourne. Capitalising on the free rounds he could take after work, this time fostered not only his love of golf but also amateur golf course photographer. Simultaneously, Gary founded GOLFSelect 26 years ago, organising corporate events for brands such as Mercedes Benz, and later, golf travel. Word spread quickly about his photographs and in the most organic way possible, through word of mouth, Gary found a great purpose in golf photography. Not only could this promote his travel business but in turn, they have all benefited each other. Furthermore, Gary is fortunate that he can combine his three loves in a web of golf, photography and computers.
A surprising part of the process is the way that Gary’s photography has scaled in the last five to seven years. He values social media as the lynchpin for the worldwide awareness and demand of his craft, rather than just local audiences. Despite being of a generation where social media was not ubiquitous, Gary is very active with his stories and posts a photo of a different course every day as a conversation starter and more recently can call himself an author, having compiled his work into golf photography books. A pivotal moment in his career was finding a copy of his book on Australian courses at Morfontaine in France, once brought as a gift from an Aussie visitor. For Gary Lisbon, humbled would have been an understatement.
Gary’s mastery of the camera takes place in the golden hour – 30 mins at dusk and 30 mins at dawn – where the light casts dramatic shadows over the subject. This is when he finds himself akin to a “kid in a proverbial lolly shop” running around a course taking the shots which present themselves. Preparation is also of paramount importance for this tiny window of opportunity: identifying the signature holes and which direction the sun is coming from. The framing, foreground and a key feature which leads the viewer into the shot such as trees and bunkers, create interest with contrasts in colour.
Fortunately, Gary is a lark, so the frequent 3 am starts are a pleasure as the sense of anticipation of sunrise hitting the landscape is too great to allow him to luxuriate in bed. Inclement weather can be good: although rain or heavy cloud cover diffuses light, the ensuing moments after a storm, as clouds begin to part, can give way to a dramatic vista. Drones now play a major part in capturing photographs and enable him to obtain larger quantities of shots than he would on foot, not to mention the panorama from a high vantage point which would be otherwise impossible. This a far cry from Gary’s experience with helicopters, where vivid memories of using gaffer tape to make sure the seatbelt couldn’t be released as he hung out of the helicopter with no door still haunt him.
Visually, there are two courses which Gary rates above the rest: Cypress Point in California, most notably the 16th Hole looking over the Pacific Ocean and Lofoten Links in Norway where the Northern Lights pay a regular visit. Others to note are Leopard Creek in South Africa, Morfontaine in France and Hirono in Japan. Gary prefers the natural lie of the land in links courses which aren’t necessarily green and with the lumpy, bumpy fairways over the more manicured courses, a common trend in Asia. He enjoys many courses in Continental Europe, through wooded forests, with architectural influences from Alistair MacKenzie, Tom Simpson and Harry Colt.
Unsurprisingly, luxury golfing experiences have been a major upside to Gary’s trade. A stand-out experience took place on the Whisky-producing island of Jura, one of the Southernmost Inner Hebrides Islands off the West Coast of Scotland. Ardfin Estate, owned by fellow Aussie Greg Coffey, features on many versions of the world’s top 100 golf courses. Not only is Ardfin a geographical masterpiece but the quality of the fine dining and accommodation even surpass the illustrious land and seascape. It’s what you would expect from Scottish hospitality and design with stag antlers on the walls, an extensive whisky collection and a restaurant that serves great beef, game and local seafood.
The luxury extends to the traditional halfway house between the 11th and 12th holes where an exceptional three-course lunch is prepared and served in a stone boathouse, the infamous location where the band The KLF burnt one million pounds as a political protest. Private members club Loch Lomond has been another outstanding luxury encounter along with Les Bordes in France. Further afield, Nine Bridges in Jeju Island, Korea, along with many of the lodges of New Zealand’s golf courses.
It’s hard to believe that Gary still has yet to visit any courses in South America and Canada and you can guarantee bit by bit he will be ticking them all off his list. He now finds himself visiting courses ten years apart and appreciating the significant and pronounced changes from his original photographs. Gary’s golf photography is bringing out his most accomplished offering so far: a book showcasing his favourite courses worldwide. He has also turned photos into jigsaw puzzles after he produced and sold them around the world during the pandemic, providing revenue that they could not have otherwise received. For Gary, necessity has been the mother of invention and adaptability has been a key component of his success. Now that his three children are old enough, he is less alone and able to share his experiences with his wife, who is able to accompany him on his adventures. Whatever the course, his photos invoke a sense of wanting to be there. Gary Lisbon’s intention is that he gets people to ask ‘where is that place?’ and ‘I really need to get there’. You know he will.
