Week 1

After seeing the photography of An-My Le, I decided to research it a little more. I found that her series Trap Rock resonates a lot with my personal taste in photography. Trap Rock features work that is in the category of landscape photography because they depict a vast amount of outdoor space. While there are no people (to my delight), there are prominent man-made structures. The entire series focuses on large construction sites and industrial complexes. Sometimes, the land is partially stripped, sometimes there is large gear in the frame, but these things are always dwarfed by the landscape. "I'm attracted to [the gear] for the same reason the men who join the military are attracted to it. There's...a certain excitement that takes you away from the desk and the office job."

Years ago, I began photography because I found was the best way that I could represent certain things that I see in the world. Looking out the window of a car, I am fascinated by some of the things I see, and I feel the need to harness them. Like if I don't capture it somehow, it will build up and drive me insane. These scenes that I am fascinated by include those that An-My Le photographed in Trap Rock. These photographs are very much about the structures associated with construction. They contain lots of metal that tend to cris-cross over each other, sometimes symmetrically and sometimes not. They contain muddy roads trampled by huge construction equipment, seemingly abandoned when there is no activity.

These photographs appear very still, as if they have been temporarily abandoned by the people who dwell there. Even in the top photograph, where there is a blurry stripe of a train speeding past (I did not see it until the artist pointed it out while speaking about it). They are heavily industrial, but contain bits of nature like trees and the occasional shrub. I chose these photographs to write about because they embrace the industrial side of Trap Rock the most. They feature vast sprawling complexes of metal and wire as they appear without human movement and presence.

While Trap Rock inspires me visually, An-My Le's military work inspires me conceptually. "I think I have very conflicted ideas about the military. It was something that drew me, but at the same time it was something that was repellent because of what had happened in Vietnam," says Le about her interest in the American military. The connection between the photographs of Trap Rock and her collections Small Wars and 29 Palms is the equipment used in both industries. Le is interested in photographing the often large machinery the military uses, making it appear dwarfed by the landscape. This is because she believes that no matter what, humans are actually quite small compared to nature.