u/stormbear

Nikon Z8
Nikkor Z 28-400mm f/4-8 VR
California

This is a photo of my favorite Bristlecone Pine tree, somewhere in the White Mountains of California. I must have over 100 photos of this tree - multiple cameras, multiple sensors and multiple film emulsions. This photo is one of my favorites.

Nikon N8008s
Nikkor 50mm, f/1.8
LomoChrome Turquoise 100-400
Las Cruces, NM

Nikon Z8, Nikkor Z 28-400 f/4-8 VR
Rock Hound State Park, NM

This is an ocotillo and it is incredibly common across the Chihuahuan and Sonoran deserts of southern New Mexico. In spring and occasionally after summer monsoons, the very tips of the canes produce clusters of fiery red-orange, tubular flowers that are highly attractive to migrating hummingbirds.

Nikon Z8, Nikkor Z 28-400 f/4-8 VR
Las Cruces, NM

This is a late night image of a full moon behind the frond of a Pampas Grass bush.

Hasselblad 503cx, 80mm f/2.8
Kodak Portra 400
White Sands State Park

Aztec Ruins National Monument, NM

Nikon Z8
Nikkor Z 28-400 f/4-8 VR

Somewhere in the Gila National Forest.

Hasselblad 503cx
80mm f/2.8
Kodak 400TX

Found in the Sequoia National Forest before a wildfire destroyed them.

Part of the "Declaración: Objects Of An Unfinished Country" series submitted to the Las Cruces Declaration/Declaración – Call for Art.

“Declaration/Declaración: Objects Of An Unfinished Country” is a photographic still-life project created in response to the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence and the continuing question of what that document means in the Borderlands. Rather than treating the Declaration as a settled historical artifact, the work approaches it as an active, unresolved promise: a statement of idealism that has always existed alongside conflict, exclusion, expansion, hope, and contradiction. Through symbolic objects arranged with the clarity of product photography, the project examines the American experiment with democracy as something still being measured, claimed, divided, repaired, and argued over.

The three images use constructed objects as small monuments to large national tensions. A white pennant planted in a brick of soil suggests territory, possession, and the fragile authority of claims. A plumb bob suspended between markers labeled “US” and “MX” turns the border into both a measurement and a wound, invoking the long history of land, governance, and identity in a region shaped by Spain, Mexico, the United States, and Indigenous presence. A heavy stone pressing down on layered colored paper beside the word “equal” addresses the pressure placed on the Declaration’s most famous promise, asking whether equality has been upheld, deferred, burdened, or only partially imagined.

Rooted in New Mexico and the Texas Borderland, this project offers a non-traditional view of the founding of the United States from a region whose American experience did not begin on the East Coast and did not follow the familiar national myth. Here, the ideals of the Declaration arrived through conquest, treaty, territorial redefinition, cultural survival, and contested belonging. 

“Declaration/Declaración: Objects Of An Unfinished Country” uses minimal objects, vivid color, and borderland symbolism to ask how the original promises of the United States have played out over time, and how those promises continue to evolve in a place where nationhood has always been layered, bilingual, disputed, and unfinished.

Dioramas were handmade by the photographer.

Nikon Z8, NIKKOR Z MC 105mm f/2.8 VR S

Part of the "Declaración: Objects Of An Unfinished Country" series submitted to the Las Cruces Declaration/Declaración – Call for Art.

“Declaration/Declaración: Objects Of An Unfinished Country” is a photographic still-life project created in response to the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence and the continuing question of what that document means in the Borderlands. Rather than treating the Declaration as a settled historical artifact, the work approaches it as an active, unresolved promise: a statement of idealism that has always existed alongside conflict, exclusion, expansion, hope, and contradiction. Through symbolic objects arranged with the clarity of product photography, the project examines the American experiment with democracy as something still being measured, claimed, divided, repaired, and argued over.

The three images use constructed objects as small monuments to large national tensions. A white pennant planted in a brick of soil suggests territory, possession, and the fragile authority of claims. A plumb bob suspended between markers labeled “US” and “MX” turns the border into both a measurement and a wound, invoking the long history of land, governance, and identity in a region shaped by Spain, Mexico, the United States, and Indigenous presence. A heavy stone pressing down on layered colored paper beside the word “equal” addresses the pressure placed on the Declaration’s most famous promise, asking whether equality has been upheld, deferred, burdened, or only partially imagined.

Rooted in New Mexico and the Texas Borderland, this project offers a non-traditional view of the founding of the United States from a region whose American experience did not begin on the East Coast and did not follow the familiar national myth. Here, the ideals of the Declaration arrived through conquest, treaty, territorial redefinition, cultural survival, and contested belonging. 

“Declaration/Declaración: Objects Of An Unfinished Country” uses minimal objects, vivid color, and borderland symbolism to ask how the original promises of the United States have played out over time, and how those promises continue to evolve in a place where nationhood has always been layered, bilingual, disputed, and unfinished.

Dioramas were handmade by the photographer.

Nikon Z8, NIKKOR Z MC 105mm f/2.8 VR S

“Declaration/Declaración: Objects Of An Unfinished Country” is a photographic still-life project created in response to the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence and the continuing question of what that document means in the Borderlands. Rather than treating the Declaration as a settled historical artifact, the work approaches it as an active, unresolved promise: a statement of idealism that has always existed alongside conflict, exclusion, expansion, hope, and contradiction. Through symbolic objects arranged with the clarity of product photography, the project examines the American experiment with democracy as something still being measured, claimed, divided, repaired, and argued over.

The three images use constructed objects as small monuments to large national tensions. A white pennant planted in a brick of soil suggests territory, possession, and the fragile authority of claims. A plumb bob suspended between markers labeled “US” and “MX” turns the border into both a measurement and a wound, invoking the long history of land, governance, and identity in a region shaped by Spain, Mexico, the United States, and Indigenous presence. A heavy stone pressing down on layered colored paper beside the word “equal” addresses the pressure placed on the Declaration’s most famous promise, asking whether equality has been upheld, deferred, burdened, or only partially imagined.

Rooted in New Mexico and the Texas Borderland, this project offers a non-traditional view of the founding of the United States from a region whose American experience did not begin on the East Coast and did not follow the familiar national myth. Here, the ideals of the Declaration arrived through conquest, treaty, territorial redefinition, cultural survival, and contested belonging. 

“Declaration/Declaración: Objects Of An Unfinished Country” uses minimal objects, vivid color, and borderland symbolism to ask how the original promises of the United States have played out over time, and how those promises continue to evolve in a place where nationhood has always been layered, bilingual, disputed, and unfinished.

Dioramas were handmade by the photographer.

Part of the "Declaración: Objects Of An Unfinished Country" series submitted to the Las Cruces Declaration/Declaración – Call for Art.

Nikon Z8, NIKKOR Z MC 105mm f/2.8 VR S

Here are the deets...
Location: White Sands National Park
Body: Nikon Z8
Lens: Nikkor 28-400mm Z Mount
Photo Editing App: Nitro

Title: Petrova Line Over Sonoma
Body: Nikon Z8
Lens: NIKKOR Z 28-400mm f/4-8 VR
Photo Processing App: Nitro

Pinky swears this is not AI. This is actually a lawn sprinkler shooting up in front of a sunrise in Las Cruces, New Mexico this morning. I made a negative out of the original image and tinted it to mimic the Petrova Line.

This is a negative image of a water sprinkler in front of a New Mexico sunrise.

The ever expanding land of enchantment.

Taken from the end of my street in Las Cruces, NM last night after a dust storm.

Snapped this off my back porch some time ago.