Abandoned Southwest Farmstead Beneath Cliffs Black and White Photography

Weathered Farm Buildings Dwarfed by a Broad Desert Escarpment

The buildings are small against the land around them. A weathered farmstead sits in open grass below pale cliffs, its broken rooflines and dark openings easy to pick out in this black and white photograph of the American Southwest. I kept the surrounding terrain in the frame because the scale of the setting is as important as the structures themselves.

The taller wooden building anchors the group, with lower remnants spreading to its left. A slender windmill rises nearby. Behind them, a more isolated rock face interrupts the long ridge that crosses the distance. Those different heights give the photograph its structure: low grass in front, the farmstead in the middle, and the much larger landforms beyond. In monochrome, the pale cliffs and darker buildings remain distinct without competing colours.

I am interested in what can still be observed at a place like this. The remaining walls, worn boards, and damaged roofs show the condition of the farmstead, but they do not tell me who lived here or why they left. The photograph leaves that history open rather than supplying an imagined account. What it does preserve is the relationship between human structures and a substantial landscape. The small group of buildings draws a closer look, while the broad background makes their isolation apparent. It is a rural architecture print with the space and quiet of the surrounding Southwest held firmly in view.

© Dan Kosmayer, 2010