Laura Aguilar

Please view Laura Aguilar’s “Nature Self-Portrait #12” (1996, Gelatin silver print, 16 x 20 in.).

The first time I saw Aguilar’s photography, I was living in the Sonoran Desert. I imagined the sand she place her body onto would either be scorching hot or icy cold and never comfortable. Before I knew anything about her, I wondered what drove Aguilar to the extreme of putting the sensitivity of her skin at the mercy of the desert. I liked to joke that the desert was either blazing or blustering, rarely just right. Maybe that’s a me thing, as someone who likes to always have a bottle of water at hand, maybe I’ll always feel a sense of life-threatening danger in a desert.

The black and white tones of Aguilar’s photos and the high contrast give me a sense of stillness and brings clarity to an environment that can sink into a beige wash. Because I’ve spent some time living and driving through the southwest, the image brings back the sounds, smells, sights, and feelings of it. Her work encapsulates the alone-ness that vastness can allow you to feel. It’s both terrifying and gratifying. It’s no wonder so much mythology is made of deserts. It’s an environment that brings you close to death, our ultimate freedom.

And yet, the desert still teems with life. Lizards and ants crawl over the ground. The biggest harvester ants I’ve ever seen patrol their blocks. They are the real owners of the land, underneath all of our constructions. In the sky are hawks and ravens and, where I Iived, a multitude of migrating hummingbirds. A mountain lion followed a wash into the city where it met an untimely (and illegal) death. Here I am categorizing my experiences and reliving in the past. How much one photograph can dregde up!