All About Photo is pleased to present Desert Dweller by Daniel Skwarna.
Sandrine Hermand-Grisel, Founder & Editor of All About Photo is the curator for this month’s show.
Desert Dweller
Slab City sits on the leftover infrastructure of Camp Dunlap, a WWII marine base activated in 1942 as a training camp for action in North Africa. The base also provided training areas for army troops under General Patton, a bombing range for planes from a nearby Marine Air Station, and a staging area for smaller Marine groups. It was deactivated in 1945.
When the land was returned to the State, only the concrete slab foundations remained to float on the shifting sands. Slabbers have been shifting with these sand for decades; building, scrapping, repurposing, surviving, dying. They’re a motley crew, as varied as anywhere else. The year-round population is modest. Roughy fifty stay through July and August when temperatures are mercurial and even rattlesnakes seek the shade of campers. Their ability to endure inhuman conditions year after year is matched only by a shared distaste for the gridded boiler plate of city life.
Many are on SSI, SSDI, or just plain broke. Modern American pioneers, claiming their slab and declaring themselves master. A free range society of feral folks occupying a chunk of desert in Southern California. Slabbers have different reasons for coming here and staying. Many are transient, coming for the warmth in winter. Some seek anonymity, others to forego the rat race. Veterans with PTSD neighbour hippies, meth heads, and Oxycontin addicts.
Part of the exclusive online showroom developed by All About Photo, this exhibition is on view for the entire month of February 2021 and includes twenty photographs from the project Desert Dweller.
Photo Exhibition Details
Title: Desert Dweller by Daniel Skwarna
Start Date: 01-02-2021 • End Date: 28-02-2021
Venue: All About Photo (United States)
