About Me
I grew up on a family farm in western North Dakota. My younger brother and I were the third generation of Kellers raised on that square mile of rolling hills a short drive from Lake Sakakawea. We were not much farther from the Badlands of which Teddy Roosevelt became so fond. Growing up on the land, surrounded by wide open spaces, gave me a love of landscape and scenery that will remain with me forever and is a major part of my photography. Today, I make my home in Sioux City, Iowa. My global travels also supply me with ample subject matter.
Biography
A native of Halliday, North Dakota, I attended North Dakota State University in Fargo, where I earned a B.S. in mathematics with a minor in computer science and completed the University Honors Program. I then attended the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, earning a Ph.D. in mathematics and serving extensively in Graduate Student Government. After graduate school, I began the nomadic phase typical of so many academics today and moved to London for a two-year fellowship at the London School of Economics and Political Science. It was while living in the United Kingdom that my passions for travel and photography emerged. I am an avid collector of miles and points to subsidize my international travel habit, and I began taking photographs simply to document my travels. As time has gone on, however, I've begun thinking more artistically about my photography. While living in the UK, I managed to visit all four of the home nations, travel to a number of continental European countries, and made my first trip to Australia. After my time in London came to an end, I returned to my Midwestern roots and spent a year at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln as a Research Assistant Professor. My time in Nebraska was short-lived, however, when I accepted a tenure-track position in the Department of Mathematics at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia beginning in Fall 2013. I lived in Lexington until July 2018, when I returned to the Midwest to join the faculty at Morningside College in Sioux City, Iowa.
Photography
Given my origins as a photographer in documenting my travels, it is probably not surprising that much of my photography focuses on landscape work. I love photographing natural beauty, but the architectural beauty of our built environment fascinates me as well. I can't imagine a day when I tire of photographing bridges or night cityscapes. I am working on developing an eye for more close-up sorts of photography, and my role as faculty athletics mentor to the Washington and Lee University Baseball team gave me an opportunity to practice my sports and action photography.
I am indebted to the members of the Rockbridge Camera Club in Lexington, Virginia. They taught me so much about photography and challenged me to become better. I am glad to have found a new photographic home with the Sioux City Camera Club, a member of the North Central Camera Club Council (N4C).