This Land is Your Land

Divining Western Waters #13 by Laurie Brown

Laurie Brown is an American photographer born in Austin, Texas, and raised in Los Angeles, California. She received a B.A. in International Relations from Scripps College in Claremont, California, and an M.A. Degree in Fine Arts from California State University, Fullerton. As a descendant of a pioneer family that came to California in a covered wagon in 1864, Brown has a vested interest in documenting how the myth of the American West has impacted the landscape of Southern California. Working with panoramic photographs of mediated landscapes in late 20th and early 21st century America, Brown's photographs capture the complex relationships between humans and nature. Most of her work utilizes a panoramic format to capture the vastness of the landscape and to document how humans have evolved in a specific environment over time. On the one hand, these photographs record the invasion of "virgin territory" by high-tech developments, while also revealing a quiet, almost surreal beauty. These places exist at the crux of those searching for the American Dream in these newly developed suburbs and a fear of what will be lost through "terraforming." 

Along with numerous solo and group exhibitions and permanent collections in many museums, Brown published her first book, Recent Terrains: Terraforming the American West, in 2000. Her latest book was published in 2013, titled Las Vegas Periphery: Views from the Edge. Additionally, she was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship Grant in 1978 and was designated Outstanding Individual Artist of the Year by ARTS Orange County in 2002.

[These images] are not of the past, or of the present, but of the future. Of a terraformed future... Terraformed into oblivion. We have seen the future, and we no longer have a place in it. The end of place, that is what these images of America evoke. The state of total, dehumanized placelessness. - Charles E. Little, Recent Terrains 

Divining Western Waters #13 reminds us that climate and rivers don’t recognize borders. When we take too much water for urban development, our neighbors might be left “divining” or searching for this essential resource. This image comprises three photographs charting the changing landscape of Orange County. The large panoramic photograph depicts a slice of the recent past -- suburban homes unnaturally plotted into the landscape. The two smaller sepia images represent the landscape before development. These were designed to be viewed through a stereoscope, a viewing device popular between 1850 and 1900 that enhanced the depth of landscape images. Even in the arid West, plant and wildlife still flourished. The grasses in the top images might be drawing from groundwater in short supply after the introduction of resource-hungry housing. 

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