Imperial Valley Cultivated RunOff

The Imperial Valley represents one of Californias most important regions of industrial agriculture The systems runoff flows through pipes pumps and canals leading to the Salton Sea an artificial lake that is approaching ecological as well as economic disaster Initially appearing as nothing more than spectacular documents of agricultural monocultures the shots become increasingly abstract Is this an actual or artificially simulated landscape This ambiguity is precisely the point The Imperial Valley is becoming the Uncanny Valley a place that is not yet or no longer natural and thereby appears eerie Although manmade it is not a place for people anymore neither ontologically nor in reality The postapocalypse is not a matter of the future we are already in the thick of it Claudia Slanar