Ever wondered what it would look like if you took a photograph at each highway exit and then lined them up? This series of photos was taken during the drive from Costa Mesa to San Francisco, July 15, 2010, and was found, as Affichage Sauvage, Suite Irvine, to lend symmetry and “experienceness” to my 3-year stay in Southern California, as it paralleled a trying drive southward in September, 2007. Both drives took highways 5 and 580.

The area to be photographed was from the end of the Los Angeles area to the beginning of the San Francisco area, and, as such, the first step was to determine the borders of these relatively porous geographical and social entities. I judged this by the presence of tract housing, highway infrastructure, and traffic. North of Los Angeles had a false ending or two, but finally, after Santa Clarita, seemed to be more Californian than Los Angelino, even though the social center of gravity for Santa Clarita is undoubtedly Los Angeles proper. On 580, East of the San Francisco Bay, I predicted, based on my prior project there, that North Flynn Road would be the last exit before traffic and transportation signaled a return to a metropolitan area, and this did in the end prove to be the case, although I stopped at the first Livermore exit to be sure of it.

The manner in which the photographs were produced went as follows:

At each exit from highway 5 or 580, with the exception of junctions marked only by road numbers and still-distant destinations, I exited the highway. After engaging the exit, I proceeded to the intersection with the first road, and pulled to the side directly before the intersection. If this was impossible, I turned right and pulled to the side as soon as possible. If, immediately from the exit, it was evident that I would not be able to pull to the side at the first intersection, or if it seemed easier to pull to the side beforehand, I did so.

After pulling to the roadside, I stepped out of the car and took two photographs, the first of which was to be in the first series, titled Volume 1 (Facing Away from the Sun), and the second, Volume 2 (Facing the Sun). In the first case, I moved to the corner of the car furthest from the sun and then took a photograph, camera parallel to the Earth’s surface, pointed such that the sun was directly behind me. The other series was constituted symmetrically, on the other side if the car.

It remains to be seen if any ecological or cultural differences are visible between these images.