Strip Mine, Spoil Piles, and Intersected Water Table Possibly 1985 - 2010

David T. Hanson made this photograph, *Strip Mine, Spoil Piles, and Intersected Water Table*, using the camera to record the earth’s surface. It's about destruction, but also about the way things settle and reshape themselves. The tan and beige tones are almost like a muted color field painting, if you zoom in on an area, you start to see the physical texture. The photograph invites you to consider what the artist sees, the piles of earth, the water, and how they connect. There's something very tactile about how the light rakes across the ridges and the strange, still water. The photograph has a contemplative quality and is about how to reshape an understanding of the land. It reminds me of some of Robert Smithson’s earth works. They both are invested in similar ideas around landscape, looking, and the way that time and process change the world.