Observations in an unoccupied wilderness..

Car Wreck. Anza Borrego 2025

Looking for signs that we exist has always been my thing since I started making photographs. The desert landscape in particular is great for this kind of thing because it is so barren making things like car wrecks easier to spot. Having spent the last decade photographing the Mojave I now find myself exploring the Sonoran in all its fullness. Just driving through parts of the Sonoran you’d be forgiven for thinking its just another desert, like the Mojave, but despite its similarities (the parts I have been photographing lately are Rain Shadow regions like the Mojave), it is very different. To start with, this place is Biblically barren. There are no Joshua Trees or flowers, just lots of rocks and Ocotillo plats that have thorns like giant needles. Much of this is to do with the Sonoran having the hottest land temperatures (where as Death Valley has the hottest air temperature). So if you want to fry eggs on rocks, this is the place. It really does look like what you would expect a desert to look like.

Camper, Sonoran Desert, 2025

My first major work in the US was the Salton Sea area of the Sonoran desert. Little did I know I would be back twenty years later doing the same thing, well sort of…

Cross, Salton Sea, 2004