21 × 17 in
 in
 cm
$2,500
The captivating composition of Rice #7, part of the artist’s Desert Houses series, draws the eye immediately to the triangular structure in the centre foreground. What at first appears to be raw, weathered wood is revealed upon closer inspection to be three mattresses, stacked before an unkempt bush—a visual struggle of humanity against the wild elements, the urge to create structure and a livable life out of chaos. Beyond the central scene, other telling features come into focus. An abandoned fire, little more than a pile of blackened stones and logs, further impresses upon the viewer that the tedious peaked mattresses serve as a makeshift dwelling, exposed to the environmental and fauna dangers of the surrounding scrublands. Yet, despite the lonely appearance of the foreground, a string of train cars is visible in the middle distance. One can easily imagine them chugging by, oblivious to the temporary home just out of view.
| Medium | Photography |
| Signature | Signed |
| Frame | Framed |
| Condition | very good |
| Seller | Private |
| Location | Vancouver, Canada |
| Provenance | Private collection, Vancouver. |
Mark Ruwedel is an American landscape photographer and educator. His books include Westward the Course of Empire, which depicts the remains of abandoned railway lines in the landscape of the western United States and Canada; and Message from the Exterior, featuring abandoned and decaying houses in desert communities around Los Angeles.
Ruwedel was an associate professor at Concordia University, Montreal from 1984 to 2001 and has been a Professor of Art at California State University, Long Beach since 2002. He has homes in both California and coastal British Columbia.
In 2014, he was awarded both a Guggenheim Fellowship and the Scotiabank Photography Award. In 2018, he was shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse Photography Prize. He has had solo exhibitions at the Chinati Foundation, Presentation House Gallery, and the Southern Alberta Art Gallery. His work is held in the collections of the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Contemporary Photography, National Gallery of Art, National Gallery of Canada, and San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
Source: Tate
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