The Big Bend

Part one of an ongoing project to photograph the remote, rugged landscapes of the Big Bend. A magical landscape located in the far western reaches of my home state of Texas, this place feels (and almost quite literally is) a million miles from nowhere—and is perhaps best described by the following quote:

"We came to the Big Bend country toward sunset, that part of Texas where the Rio Grande makes a U-shaped bend in its course. In a lifetime spent in traveling, here I came upon the greatest wonder. The mantle of God touches you; it is what Beethoven reached for in music; it is panorama without beginning or end. No fire can burn so bright, no projection can duplicate the colors that dance over the desert or the bare rock formations that form the backdrop. No words can tell you, and no painter hold it. It is only to be visited and looked at with awe. It will make you breathe deeply whenever you think of it, for you have inhaled eternity. There is no tree, no house to measure things by. You are in scale with the cactus plant, the stone in the distance — the all-important and the nothing." —Ludwig Bemelmans, “Texas Legend,” McCall’s, August 1956