Badlands, South Dakota 1990

This striking monochrome image of the South Dakota Badlands was captured by Lois Conner, sometime after she was born in 1951. The photograph shows a landscape that is both imposing and delicate. I'm thinking about the quietness and stillness of the image, and how it stands in contrast to the epic, physical drama of the landscape it depicts. The light seems soft, diffused, which almost transforms the craggy rocks into hazy, dreamlike shapes. It reminds me of the landscapes of Georgia O'Keeffe – the way she looked at the American Southwest and found something both monumental and intimate. You know, every artist is on a kind of pilgrimage, looking for something new in a landscape that's been seen a million times. And like all great landscape artists, Conner finds it.