Mojave Dreams,  2015- present, experimental documentary in progress, 16mm

The film is an experimental environmental film that investigates the current state of the Joshua tree in the Mojave National Preserve in southern California. I have been collecting footage of this iconic tree since 2015; in 2020 the Dome fire incinerated what was the densest Joshua tree forest in the world, burning an estimated one million trees in the preserve, the very area I had been filming over the years. The York fire burned more Joshua trees in summer 2023. The goal of the film is to create a record of these forests as they existed pre fire and compare it visually the post fire filming and recordings. I intend for the film to be a document and also an expressive visual and auditory poem that honors this landscape, a fragile ecosystem that lies on the front edge  of rapid environmental change that effects all earthbound creatures

Flowers series, in progress

I started growing a developer’s garden during the pandemic. These are flowers and herbs that I could harvest and use to create plant-based developers for my 16mm black and white film stock. This led me to begin shooting black and white images of my garden, closely examining these backyard beauties and wondering at their intricate natural designs. Which led to more thinking about domestic flowers, or cultivated backyard varieties and how they mix and mingle across the neighborhood and then how they compare to the wildflowers found in meadows across my part of Montana and beyond…

This is a work in progress.

Stills from: Black Hollyhock, Forget Me Not, Orchid