Thomas Livingstone’s collection of images of abandoned Colorado mining buildings showcase serenity — the beauty of aging structures, the pastoral landscapes of the San Juan Mountains.

Less peaceful, though, is the reality of what the Silverton photographer went through to capture those images: traveling over roads so rough he eventually switched to an ATV to save his truck the thrashing, scrambling over exposed hillsides while carrying camera gear, skiing into remote areas to contrast wood against snow, and pelting down trails at top speed to get below timber line as lightning storms rolled in.

Thomas Livingstone, a Silverton photographer, will celebrate the opening of his display, “Historic Treasures of the San Juan Mountains,” at a reception from 4 to 6 p.m. Friday at the Wright Opera House, where the photos will remain until Nov. 11.
Photo courtesy Thomas Livingstone

“I always had a little bit of survival gear, some food and a stove, a bivvy bag and a sleeping bag, just in case something happened or I wanted just to stay out,” Livingstone said of his expeditions.

Livingstone will display some of the images he captured during his seven-year project, “Historic Treasures of the San Juan Mountains,” at the Wright Opera House in Ouray starting Friday and running through Nov. 11.

Livingstone didn’t always plan on a career in photography.

Born in New York but raised in Boulder, he originally attended Fort Lewis College in Durango to study business. But after a brief stint working in real estate, he realized he wanted something “a little more exciting.” He was accepted into the well-known Brooks Institute of Photography in California, and embarked on a professional photography career. It’s a path that has delivered on the excitement, including participating in an expedition to the bottom of El Sótano del Barro, a nearly 1,500-foot-deep chasm in central Mexico.

Livingstone currently lives in Silverton, where he has operated Kendall Mountain Gallery for more than a decade. As he looks ahead to his next project, centered on an island chain off the coast of California, Livingstone said he’s hoping to get another artist to come and run the seasonal gallery.

“I’m 55,” he said in an interview Monday. “I have a lot of things I want to do besides hanging out in Silverton.”

The Mountain Top boarding house in Governor’s Basin as seen in 2014. The rest of the structure collapsed in the summer of 2021 after a week of heavy rain.
Photo courtesy Thomas Livingstone

This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for length.

You got your first camera when you were 10 and were published in a neighborhood newsletter. Can you talk a little bit about how you developed a love for photography?

“My parents were really into photography. They weren’t professional photographers, but they were pretty passionate. We had a dark room in our basement, so I spent a lot of time in the dark room and shooting black and white and processing it and printing it. … (I had) my first picture hanging in a gallery out in Longmont, Colorado, when I was like 12. It was a snow-covered bridge that I took up by Vail.”

Can you tell me a little bit about the Discovery Channel project you worked on?

“I was going to (the Brooks Institute), and one of my friends … was working for the Discovery Channel (as) kind of an independent producer. …Some of his Mexican friends were going to climb out of (the Sótano del Barro sinkhole in Mexico). … I was really hired as more like a cave specialist/rigger and still photographer. (He) ended up being too afraid to rappel down the pit the first week that we were down, so I ended up going down and did a lot of filming at the bottom of the pit, and spent the night down there with a couple of the Mexican climbers. … The last couple of days he got the courage up to get on the rope and rappel down it.”

Where did the idea for your current project come from?

“It wasn’t something I’d planned on, but I was up on Red Mountain shooting fall colors, I guess it was back in 2009.

I came across the Guston (boarding) house, which is an old boarding house for the Guston Mine. … I got some great shots, but that night at home I converted them to black and white just to see what they would look like. I loved how it turned out. So the idea just came up … ‘I’ll just try to get like 20 shots and have a little show at my gallery just on the old mines and mills around Silverton.’

… Then I realized there was so much more to photograph around Telluride and Lake City and Creede and Ouray. … I decided I should do the whole San Juan Mountains.”

The Guston boarding house, built in the 1890s, still stands today up on Red Mountain pass and is one of the historic buildings pictured in Silverton photographer Thomas Livingstone’s project, “Historic Treasures of the San Juan Mountains.”
Photo courtesy Thomas Livingstone

How are you hoping people will respond to this work?

“I just hope that it creates interest in preserving what we can of some of these old mining structures. … From what I’ve heard, what I photographed is like 30% of what was there 100 years ago. So basically we’ve lost 70% of the old mining structures. … Eventually, I really want to get this show up in Denver at the History Colorado museum, because they’re the ones that kind of get the money out to the counties.”

Can you talk a little bit about your philosophy on where the line is for editing and Photoshopping images?

“Nowadays you can add clouds, change the lighting. The only thing that I did that was kind of manipulating is I took out a couple of signs that were historical society signs. … And then there was one that had a lot of graffiti on it, and it wasn’t historic graffiti, so I Photoshopped the graffiti out. But as for just technically … I just would dodge and burn, just like I would do in the old days in a dark room. Dodging and burning is just kind of lightening one area and darkening other areas … and then I would just adjust the contrast and the lighting, the brightness.”

What is your next project?

“I’ve been going out to the Channel Islands off of California. … They call them the Galapagos of North America because they have, you know, certain species of animals that are only found on the islands. The oldest human remains found in North America were found out on the Channel Islands. … It could take years to do, but I’d like to photograph all the islands.”

If you go

Members of the public are invited to an opening reception for photographer Thomas Livingtone’s display, “Historic Treasures of the San Juan Mountains,” from 4 to 6 p.m. Friday at the Wright Opera House, 472 Main St. in Ouray.

Limited edition prints will be available for sale during the reception, as will copies of Livingstone’s 160-page book of the same title.

The book is also for sale at Ouray Bookshop.

For more information, visit thomaslivingstone.com.