I FOUND GOD IN THE BROKEN EARTH - Rolls 208-209

The third peak of my experience within the Ordered World in 2024—the third time that I was pulled under by waves of Transcendence to a place beyond my imagining—came unexpectedly at the end of October, following a productive couple of months after I finished shooting What My Left Hand is Doing in August. I had come away from that body of work reinvigorated, ready to spend the rest of my year seeing what new things I could find and do, which turned out to be both new places (Fort Wayne, Three Rivers) and new techniques (using manual flash, trying out the new Harman Phoenix)! Things were going well, and then one day towards the end of the month I was driving south out of South Bend to pick up a dining room table when a seemingly abandoned quarry caught my eye just past the exit ramps to the bypass. Since I was on a mission, I filed the location away in my mind for another time, and returned a couple days later after work when the light seemed right. Something was calling me to this place, something more than what I had felt in the preceding months, and I had to answer the call in the way I know best: with my camera and a couple rolls of film.

I will let the photos speak for themselves in a moment, as I find it hard to describe with words the power of this place, but I do want to point out a couple things. Firstly, the subject matter of these shots pulls on a thread that had been dangling around my work all year, the idea of the barren landscape. After reading and discussing Stephen Shore's book Modern Instances, both Jesus and I had become interested in the body of work he made in the '80's after moving out West—images of rocks and hills and fissures in the earth, without the cultural signifiers of Americana that his earlier work is known for. With those photos in my head, I had made several barren landscape photos throughout the year, but in this moment the concept reached maturation in my work. There is a definite element of tension, however, between the earth and the people who changed its shape here, and I enjoy that tension immensely. There's something interesting about the fact that I was drawn to the spiritual, elemental energy in this place, and yet the signs of humans are all around too, from the buildings and power lines that border this area to the piles of rocks and dirt that were left by the last operators working in the quarry (if that's even what it was). As I explored, I followed a progression of leaving humanity behind, first exploring the level ground around the piles before descending into the gully, where the sounds of the highway were suddenly muted, and I felt as though I could be miles away from anyone. My sense of immersion within the Ordered World grew stronger and stronger as well, especially once I reached the gully, until I was fully swept away within the currents of Transcendence, reaching the height of this experience as I emerged from the path I had taken behind a hill to see clear sunlight bathing the whole scene in a golden glow. The moment took my breath away, and I left with my spirit and mind uplifted, thankful for the chance to encounter the Divine Ground once more as October, and with it the Sunblind Season, came to a close in a warm haze of light and color!