Bremner Benedict
When I was asked to pick a few of the winners from the 2023 CENTER Awards (which I’m doing yearly now), it was an easy choice to highlight the work and process of Bremner Benedict and her project, Hidden Waters. Since the images concern water scarcity in the Western U.S. (where I happen to live), it was an essential topic for not just me but millions of people who live on these arid lands. As usual, I get a valuable education when examining works like this, so it’s a simple task to give collections of images like this as much air as possible. It’s another project centered on climate change and climate science that I wish I didn’t have to bring up. I find it disconcerting and unfortunate that these are conversations and topics that we have to address in the first place.
What’s ultimately important here is that we have intrepid artists like Benedict who go out in the field and turn these situations into something educational, shedding light on what we might accomplish if we put our heads and resources together. Beyond the importance, it’s the fact that she has built a body of work that is also quite stunning in its appearance - which only helps get more eyes on what she’s doing. Those that include research components to their work turn the often seemingly mundane into something not just interesting but fascinating, well, that is something to admire. Her entire aesthetic focuses on the land and humankind’s effect on it, and she has something to say that we should be paying attention to. So, with this, please take your time with her words and inspect the images she brings to the table. We all have much to learn.
Man-made Fly Geyser, Black Rock Desert, Nevada, U.S.
Bio -
Bremner Benedict is a photographer who focuses on the role that landscape plays in defining human experience and the effects of our disconnection from the natural world. She credits her time as a travel photographer and as the publication designer at the Natural History Museum of Northern Arizona and Western National Park History Associations as sparking her interest in environmental storytelling, blending art with natural and cultural history.
Her work has been exhibited in Florida, Massachusetts, New Mexico, Arizona, Texas, and New York. Portfolios of her work reside at Center for Creative Photography, Tucson, AZ, Texas Women’s University, Denton, TX, The Fogg Museum of Art at Harvard, Cambridge, MA, George Eastman International Museum of Photography, Rochester, NY, among others. Her Hidden Waters archive resides in the Center for Art & Environment, Reno. Benedict is a 2023 winner of Project Launch Award from CENTER Santa Fe, two Puffin Foundation grants, and artist residencies at the Museum of Northern Arizona, Joshua Tree Highlands Residency, and Shoshone Artist Residency, CA. Her lectures include Southern Wetlands Conference; CENTER Santa Fe Award Winner Presentation; Ceding Ground, artist talk, Griffin Museum of Photography, Women in Nature, lecture, Bernal Gallery, Pima Community College, Tucson; Springs Stewardship Institute Symposium, AZ.
Interview -
Michael Kirchoff: What led you in the direction of image-making in the first place? Was photography something that sparked your interest early on?
Bremner Benedict: I was hooked on photography and travel from a young age. I remember sitting in my parents’ library on Sundays, thumbing through books on photography, National Geographic magazines, and books about the West. My parents traveled overseas a lot, and my dad would come home and show us endless slideshows of everything he saw. In my 20s, I had the opportunity to travel around the world with another photographer. We spent a year photographing everything we encountered, going West from Asia to Africa and Europe.
MK: What is the one thing you wish you knew when you started making photographs?
BB: It’s an unfolding process of learning how to see and translate your interest and emotion for a subject visually. The longer you work and the deeper you go into your work, the closer those two aspects can get. There will be days when you won’t get any good images - don’t be disheartened. There will be rejections as well as successes from the world at large, but they are fleeting. And don’t compare your success to others; it's a meaningless task. Never forget how fortunate you are to be able to devote your time to something you love to do.
MK: What is it that you get out of creating photographs? Is there an overriding theme in your work that you feel best represents you as an artist?
BB: After working as a graphic designer at The Museum of Northern Arizona on the Colorado Plateau and for US Western regional National Parks, I realized I had a deep curiosity about both natural and cultural history. My time as a travel photographer inspired me to focus on the unseen corners of the environment that lie at the edge of our awareness but should be front and center. These affect our experience and add meaning and understanding to a story - and it matters. This awareness, combined with the immense importance of my relationship to the natural environment, forms an overarching theme across all of my series. With Hidden Waters in particular, I focus on dry landscapes of all kinds containing open, often spare vistas and muted colors.
Agua Caliente Spring, Sonoran Desert, Tucson, AZ
Mat and Three Bathubs, Dyke Hot Springs, Black Rock Desert, Great Basin, NV
Fencing protection for the Bighorn sheep, swallowing deep spring hole on the Old Spanish Trail going from Santa Fe, NM to Los Angeles, CA, MC Springs, Zzyxz, CA
Used for at least 1,000 years, dredged and reshaped in the 1930’s by the CCC, this Chihuahuan Desert oasis is on the migratory bird north/south flyway, Rattlesnake Springs, New Mexico
Artesian spring-fed sinkhole, Devils Inkwell, Chihuahuan Desert, NM
Barbed-wire Fencing, Blue Hole Cienega at Dawn, Chihuahua Desert, NM Liston Seep, Colorado Plateau, UT
MK: The work we are highlighting here is your project, Hidden Waters, Arid Land Springs in the American West. Can you give us an overview of the collection?
BB: I started Hidden Waters as an artist interested in the destruction of the environment, focusing on the loss of water in natural springs, an easily missed yet important feature in the environment. The more I learned about the scientific complexity and poignancy of their condition, the more science became important to this series. Since 1900, 85% of springs no longer exist due to overuse, drought, and climate change. Those that are left contain roughly 20% of the world’s endangered species. The UN and World Resources Institute predict that as much as two-thirds of the world may suffer from water scarcity by 2025 caused by depleted aquifers. This would severely hinder our ability to live in arid lands.
Blending art, science, and facts about the urgency of saving our springs helps make the story more accessible to everyone. I want this project to start a dialogue about their protection, and spotlighting these few remaining before they are gone will hopefully help encourage people to act before it’s too late.
MK: How did the vulnerability of dry land springs even appear on your radar? They seem to be a lesser-known indicator of climate change as a whole and seemingly something that is rarely discussed, if at all.
BB: A few years ago, while at a Hopi Native American festival in Flagstaff, Arizona, I was intrigued when tribal members of the Black Mesa Water Coalition told me how worried they were about the loss of their reservation’s springs, which they depended on for drinking water. Very serendipitously, a few weeks later, I was invited on a springs inventory trip into the arid mountains of northeast Arizona in which the trip biologist described how much complex life exists in a tiny roadside spring. That trip left me awestruck and inspired.
As I continued to gather more facts and understanding about the topic, it was clear that not many people studied dryland springs - and, more importantly, there were no art projects solely devoted to them. Especially as I began to think more deeply about the implications for those who live in dry landscapes - such as Native Americans, plants and animals, residents of small towns and large cities of the West - I decided to record the few remaining springs before they were lost forever.
MK: You were recently awarded the Project Launch Grant from CENTER for this important work. How will this award and the funds help you to further your goals for the project?
BB: I have already used some of these funds to participate in two environmentally focused exhibitions with photographers I deeply respect. Additionally, I will work on getting the work out through talks, publications, and multimedia.
Wild Donkey by Bush at Hoof Trampled, Wild Burro Seep, Mojave Desert, Oasis Valley, NV
Stop on the Tohono O’odham Nation’s Sacred Salt PilgrimageTrail at 16,000 year-old Quitobaquito Springs, US/Mexico Border, Sonoran Desert, AZ
Water extraction borehole of last Ice-Age water located on the historic Old Spanish Trail, Tecopa Hot Spring, CA
Last standing pipe from abandoned 1800s trading post, water used by local ranchers. Moenave Road, Dine Nation, AZ
Dewatered dry, Big Uncle's Spring, Colorado Plateau, AZ
Red Water Tower at Colson Ponds, (Indian Camp) Numic/Southern Paiute Origin and Spiritual Pilgrimage Site, Oasis Valley, NV
MK: So many of the springs you’ve photographed seem small and in remote locations. What is the process like for even finding, let alone photographing them?
BB: When I began looking for springs, I knew only one person who studied them, and there was little information on the internet. I began with USGS maps and those road atlases that mark springs with tiny blue dots. However, they are often inaccurately marked and don’t tell you if the spring is still viable. I ended up having more success in finding locations by talking to people - scientists, landowners, and local people who knew where they were. It was really striking to see how many people were aware of springs and relied upon them, yet it is such an under-discussed topic outside of those affected.
One serendipitous meeting occurred a couple of years ago when a friend of a museum curator in northern Nevada had a friend with a spring on his property. It took many texts with him before I found it. A year later, when I returned to photograph more springs in the Black Rock Desert, that spring owner - who I never met in person - would text me directions every day to a different spring, and I sent him images of what I found. I also began to rely on National Refuge and Park biologists and hydrologists as resources, asking if they had a favorite or iconic spring to share. Usually, I would end up talking to a chain of people before finally, whoever was the key to the spring.
Whenever I felt lost as to where to go next, information would appear out of nowhere. I almost felt as if the springs wanted me to tell their story. That is what sustained me over the long term.
MK: It seems that the water crisis in the American West is finally seeing more attention of late. As someone who has grown up in California, this feels like something that has been brewing for far too long. What do you see as some early-stage positive steps to be taken in alleviating this crisis, or is that even a possibility? Also, are there ways for the average citizen to either contribute or learn more?
BB: I do feel hopeful that people are beginning to understand there are limits to our resources. This year, the New York Times has been writing a series of articles about the potentially dire conditions of water in the West. At the moment, the Western states that depend on Colorado River water are beginning to have meaningful talks about sharing and conservation.
The Obama administration did pass a law protecting upstream creeks that feed rivers, but unfortunately, there was no mention of springs or aquifers. Few people truly understand the ecological role springs play in promoting not only biodiversity but also in telling us the health and longevity of their aquifers. The hydrology of springs and their connections to aquifers is extremely complex; even the scientists who study them are still learning how it works.
What we can do is believe climate change is real and recognize that diminishing water resources in the US West are a given - now we need to act. Lastly, to quote Jane Goodall, “What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make. The greatest danger to our future is apathy.”
MK: Over the years, the tools we use to make photographs have changed in dramatic ways, not to mention the vehicles we use to promote the final works we make. How do you keep up with these changes, and do you see there being any further significant change as lens-based media continues to progress?
BB: No matter how you achieve it, the fundamental process is still the same: making images. Today, it seems like every way of image-making is possible - but it’s the idea behind what you are making that is the most important part.
Personally, I haven’t decided what I think about AI generation as a whole and in the ways that some people are starting to use it. But AI tools for finessing the image work great as a virtual darkroom tool.
To keep up with these changes, I look at other photographers' work all the time, particularly those who use different presentations than I do, whether they are alternative and antique processes or created with AI tools.
Cattails in the Rain, Longstreet Springs, Mojave Desert, NV
Accidental Red Fire Retardant Airdrop, Weimer Springs, Coconino Forest, AZ
Abandoned Cattle Watering Trough with Earth Crack on Hole-in-the-Wall Mormon Trail, across the Escalante, Liston Seep, Colorado Plateau, UT
Beam from Geothermal Mine, Pinto East Hot Springs, Black Rock Desert, Great Basin, NV
Water Storage Tank of Captured Spring, Pat Tub # 1, Colorado Plateau, AZ
Water mining at Bog Hot Springs, Black Rock Desert, NV
MK: Do you collaborate with like-minded individuals on projects, or do you find it more productive to handle everything yourself? Are there any collaborations in the past that have been particularly beneficial?
BB: Handling everything myself isn’t really an option when I’m chasing down such remote and niche resources with complex science behind them. I see all of the scientists and landowners who show me where I can photograph springs are my collaborators. Their excitement is infectious and energizing, and their knowledge is unmatched. This project is truly telling a story, and while I can bring together the story through my photography, all of the background work and research are vital to make the end result possible.
MK: Was there a specific point in time when you felt that you had found your voice in photography and became satisfied with the direction of your work? Do you ever truly find yourself in a good place with your images, or are you always searching for more?
BB: While I’ve always liked photographing landscapes, especially in the Southwest, I became interested in exploring human impact and land use. I did a series called Gridlines, focusing on electrical towers and lines and how they interrupt our romantic picture of a pristine Western landscape. My next series, Re-Imagining Eden, centered on recreated diorama habitats that preserve a memory of an Eden that was over-exploited. It was at that point that I realized land use environmental loss was where I wanted to put all my attention going forward. My Hidden Waters series was when I found my voice became loud enough for others to hear.
While I have felt good about my last three series, I see them as forming the groundwork for the projects I’m doing now. When working on a series, I want to make images that are a progression from what I have previously done - something that’s better seen and visualized. The process is never final.
MK: Many thanks for so much intriguing information regarding your photography. What’s next for you? It’s clear that there is much to be done with Hidden Waters, but are there any other projects you have your eye on?
BB: There are always more springs, of course. Looking for a hopeful view going forward, I will be working in two areas where people are engaged in restoration and conservation: a spring-fed Cienega in New Mexico and a valuable groundwater basin watershed in California.
You can find more of Bremner’s work on her website here.
All photographs, ©Bremner Benedict
