On the Verge

My work critically reflects upon human beings and their relationship with the natural environment with the challenges of climate change at the center of that relationship. It also imagines alternate (or perhaps future) realities marked by adaptation and assimilation. Through my photo-based landscapes, installations, video and photo-sculptures, natural landscapes and human-made objects are impossibly adapted to new roles where they coexist in a fantastical reality. I have taken over 8,000 photographs of the American West in the past few years. They were taken around Lake Powell, a water reservoir that is drying up at an alarming rate due to climate change and Glen Canyon Dam, which contributes to the water allocation from the Colorado River to millions of people across the West. Seen from a distance, the landscapes appear to be idyllic and are reminiscent of 18th Century English landscape paintings. But upon closer viewing one sees that not everything is a utopia. A garbage dumpster, a parking lot made of asphalt, a water pump; these details highlight how the human imprint interrupts the beauty of the natural world and acts as a reminder of the power of human influence.