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>The photographer Laura Aguilar’s most formally inventive series consist of nude self-portraits taken in the New Mexican desert. By curling against the rocky ground, or stretching out along the edge of a lagoon, Aguilar makes the curves and shadows of her round body echo beautifully the shapes of the landscape around her. In one playful image, she is bent over so that only her backside is visible at the bottom of the frame, its sculptural roundness, and dark crack, mimicking the shape of a rock formation above her. In other photos, she lies curled on the ground, facing away from the camera, or doubled over in a ball, as if she’s retreating into herself or protecting herself from the onlooker’s gaze. She is at once part of the American land, and the viewer’s eye, and apart from them: in her own words, both present and persistently unseen.
