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“Ground Up: Photographs of the Ground in the Margins
of Los Angeles” uses, as a point of departure, soil maps
of Los Angeles County published by the United States Department
of Agriculture. These maps, created by soil scientists from
the National Soil Survey Center, a division of the USDA, consist
of aerial photos with soil types superimposed. Soil Maps provide
evidence of a great variety of human interventions in the landscape,
from landfills to new construction, from mining to agriculture.
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Malleable,
soil can be excavated and mounded, built upon and abandoned, mined
and amended. A deep gash becomes a landfill, a mountain is scraped
for houses, a trench becomes a road, a deep shaft becomes a mine
and the mine begets a mountain of tailings. Soil is a living fabric,
an organic skin wrapping the earth’s stone and molten core,
once disturbed it is never the same. Construction projects alter
the soil just as the great earthquake faults of this region that
also lift, excavate and transform. |
A
version of this exhibit is now available online. [
see the exhibit ]
Margins in our Midst: A Journey Into
Irwindale, a related tour, took place 9/20/03. [
info + photos ] |
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© 2003 The Center
for Land Use Interpretation. |
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