A Year in the Southwest, a Botanical Journey

Claudia Toutain-Dorbec, an Oregon Coast migrant in New Mexico, finds herself in a land of snakes and sagebrush, and explores the Southwest botanical countryside through her camera lens. She discovers it filled with cowboy charm, ancient Native American pueblos, the Rio Grande and the Santa Fe Railroad, towering mesas, buffalo, hidden arroyos, juniper, pinon and cottonwood trees. There is a great diversity of landscapes and plant life on Earth, and nowhere is this more dramatic than in the American Southwest. The photographs of Claudia Toutain-Dorbec are about her relationship with the natural world. She approaches her botanical subjects as a portrait, creating images that are forceful, meaningful and beautiful. She walks a tightrope between the real and mystical. Her wilderness is trodden, yet she accepts it as it is: worthy of exploration. Perfect. Imperfect. Inspirational. “Transcending the simple beauty of appearances-a gentle, scented representation of flowers-Claudia’s work reveals the human fragility, anxieties, and questioning that show through in their already faded features.” Nicole Zapata-Aube – Chief curator of the museums of Tarbes, France – Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres