PrintA Comprehensive Look At Texas' Big Bend
EnlargeTexas' Big Bend: A Photographic Adventure
by Michael H. Marvins
www.brightskypress.com
For more than 20 years, Michael H. Marvins has traveled Big Bend, the remote jewel tucked in the crook of the Rio Grande in far West Texas, crisscrossing the region’s 800,000 acres on foot, by car, and on horseback. Over that time, the fourth-generation professional photographer has captured the area’s grandeur, rich history, and ecological diversity using equipment ranging from fine larger-format instruments to inexpensive pocket gear.
In the first comprehensive photographic study of the Big Bend region, Marvins artistically presents the land that he loves, from the majesty of its spectacular geology to its eccentric inhabitants, from the raw beauty of a harsh landscape to the remnants of the area’s colorful past. The 192-page hardcover volume features more than 200 museum-quality color photos and an informative foreword by Roy Flukinger, a photography curator at the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas. Of Marvins’ work, Flukinger says, “[W]hen one can see as instinctively and poetically as Mike Marvins, one has already traveled another long road, this one leading from the heart to the eye.”
Marvins, whose work hangs in such prestigious institutions as London’s Victoria and Albert Museum, Houston’s The Museum of Fine Arts, and the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth, Texas, is donating his royalties to the Friends of Big Bend National Park and other non-profit groups that support the region.
Issue: July 2010
