Fertile Mesilla Valley (Las Cruces, NM)
2019
Handmade wood box, 3 panes of glass, unique screen print, vintage postcard
3.5” x 5.5” x 1.5”
Heart of the Navajo Indian Country (Gallup, NM)
2019
Handmade wood box, 3 panes of glass, unique screen print, vintage postcard
3.5” x 5.5” x 1.5”
"As Behind Many a Rock, a Blood-thirsty Savage Lurked" (Cimarron Canyon, NM)
2019
Handmade wood box, 3 panes of glass, unique screen print, vintage postcard
5.5” x 3.5” x 1.5”
Road to the Hill (Los Alamos, NM)
2019
Handmade wood box, 3 panes of glass, unique screen print, vintage postcard
3.5” x 5.5” x 1.5”
The “Enchanted Ranch” in the Land of Enchantment, (Santa Fe, NM)
2019
Handmade wood box, 3 panes of glass, unique screen print, vintage postcard
3.5” x 5.5” x 1.5”
Presenting: A Colorful View (Bingham Canyon Mine, UT)
2021
Handmade wood box, 3 panes of glass, unique screen print, vintage postcard
3.5” x 5.5” x 1.5”
High Above the Colorado River (Dead Horse Point, UT)
2021
Handmade wood box, 3 panes of glass, unique screen print, vintage postcard
3.5” x 5.5” x 1.5”
"A Navajo chieftain and his squaw" ( Monument Valley, AZ)
2021
Handmade wood box, 3 panes of glass, unique screen print, vintage postcard
3.5” x 5.5” x 1.5”
Boating on Lake Powell (Twilight Canyon, UT)
2021
Handmade wood box, 3 panes of glass, unique screen print, vintage postcard
5.5”x 3.5” x 1.5”
Man's Greatest Engineering Achievement (Lake Mead, AZ)
2022
Handmade wood box, 3 panes of glass, unique screen print, vintage postcard
3.5” x 5.5” x 1.5”
Lands of Enchantment challenges the glossy, picturesque, Kodachrome mirages of colonialist America. The form was inspired by a vintage postcard diorama I found in a local shop. I was captivated that someone took the time to create such an homage to a place they had been. Postcards, I thought, are the talismans of tourism. They memorialize one’s experience in a place, they idealize the place itself. But what if they revealed truths?
In these dioramas, idyllic postcard imagery is obscured by truths: black text listing the indigenous tribes who have stewardship over the land and red text revealing an unspoken truth about the condition of that land.
Titles are taken directly from text on the postcard back.
Looking Upstream (Glen Canyon Dam)
2021
photographic prints, screen prints on plexiglass, wood
29 1/2″ x 43 1/2″ x 9 1/2″
Our Vested Heritage (Mt. Rushmore)
2021
photographic prints, screen prints on plexiglass, wood
29 1/2″ x 43 1/2″ x 9 1/2″
Titan of Chasms (Grand Canyon)
2021
photographic prints, screen prints on plexiglass, wood
29 1/2″ x 43 1/2″ x 9 1/2″
Undefined (Bears Ears)
2021
photographic prints, screen prints on plexiglass, wood
29 1/2″ x 43 1/2″ x 9 1/2″
Series II
These large-scale iterations of the series were created in 2021 with support from a MAKE grant from Regional Arts and Culture Council. The postcards for Series II have been magnified to amplify the dispatch, like billboards on driven thoroughfares. At this scale, the postcard images begin to dissolve into to their constituent dots, revealing their faded hues and worn out treatises of so-called excellence.
All photos by Mario Gallucci.
Lists of indigenous names provided from nativeland.ca