A 2 week roadtrip spanning the coast of California and back spurred a collection of photos comprising of only places and people experienced directly off of Route 1, with an emphasis of avoiding the points of interests already “pointed” out. Using only color slide film at 50 ISO, the contrast in the colors of the photos are consistently deep, yet smooth. Much of the maritime landscapes we encountered had the same feeling; it is not hard to guess the original appeal of the place to the Clovis people, later the American Indians and later Europeans alike. Yet there is a tension in the landscape that is perhaps only recent, due to our modern industrial agriculture: side by side are fields that seem to come from different climates; one lush, green vinyard full of bursting grapes, the other cracked dust full of brown brambles. Fuzzy peach hills line the outskirts of the coast, summer unkind to a parched un-irrigated earth. Remains of monasteries and small dusty one-street towns still exist – just take an unnamed, sometimes even unnumbered exit, and you’ll get more than you bargained for. As a last stop before flying out, we rolled into Jamala – a camping-cum-trailer-park paradise.

Documentary Photographs by Isabelle Carbonell