Muddy Treads

Peter Sutherland is a New York City based artist. His work employs some of the techniques of traditional documentary photography to capture the hidden beauty of ordinary objects and everyday situations. Many of the photos in this book were taken in Alaska; the others are from California, Colorado, Utah, and Vermont. From the introduction: "There was a large chunk of land behind my junior high school known as 'The Hills.' It was an unclaimed no man's land, where you could do whatever you wanted. There were strange half built sheds, bags of lawn clippings, some illegally dumped furniture, and the occasional dead animal. Locals would go there to drink beer, burn stuff for fun, and drive four wheelers on the hills, some of which were steep and untracked. There were arched tracks left behind by motorcyclists on the hillsides where they had attempted to ride over the highest point (usually a stump). There was a muddy pond and twisted-up sage brush; all of which was hidden from civilization... I like empty plots of land like that one. There is always something messed up about them that keeps them from being developed and there's a special kind of freedom that allows for stoners to go four wheeling in abandoned jeeps. The entire state of Alaska feels like a more pristine, grown-up version of one of those areas and everything about it is just a bit too rugged and crazy for the masses." Limited edition of 1000 copies. Color.