Image 1 of 1
Image 1 of 1
Image 1 of 1
Image 1 of 1
This photograph was made using the historic dry plate photographic process, a silver-based technique that predates modern film and digital photography. Dry plates require careful preparation and a single exposure, encouraging a slower, more deliberate engagement with the landscape — one that mirrors the layers of history embedded in even the most deliberately constructed places.
Apacheland Movie Ranch was built in 1960 as a working western film set in the shadow of the Superstition Mountains. For decades it served as a stage for the American myth — Ronald Reagan, Steve McQueen, and Audie Murphy all worked here. In 1968, Elvis Presley arrived to film Charro, his only non-singing role, and the white clapboard church visible in this plate was built for that production. Two fires — in 1969 and again in 2004 — took most of the ranch. The church survived both.
Rather than documenting Apacheland as a ruin or a curiosity, this plate reads the site as a kind of final frame — the credits rolling on an era of filmmakers, stuntmen, and character actors whose names rarely made the poster.
Part of the NomadType Southwest series, this work explores American landscapes through historic photographic methods, using 19th-century processes to reflect on impermanence, myth, and the enduring weight of place.
Please visit my YouTube Channel to find out more about the making of this image in the episode:
This photograph was made using the historic dry plate photographic process, a silver-based technique that predates modern film and digital photography. Dry plates require careful preparation and a single exposure, encouraging a slower, more deliberate engagement with the landscape — one that mirrors the layers of history embedded in even the most deliberately constructed places.
Apacheland Movie Ranch was built in 1960 as a working western film set in the shadow of the Superstition Mountains. For decades it served as a stage for the American myth — Ronald Reagan, Steve McQueen, and Audie Murphy all worked here. In 1968, Elvis Presley arrived to film Charro, his only non-singing role, and the white clapboard church visible in this plate was built for that production. Two fires — in 1969 and again in 2004 — took most of the ranch. The church survived both.
Rather than documenting Apacheland as a ruin or a curiosity, this plate reads the site as a kind of final frame — the credits rolling on an era of filmmakers, stuntmen, and character actors whose names rarely made the poster.
Part of the NomadType Southwest series, this work explores American landscapes through historic photographic methods, using 19th-century processes to reflect on impermanence, myth, and the enduring weight of place.
Please visit my YouTube Channel to find out more about the making of this image in the episode:
