[Image: From “Cropped” by Gerco de Ruijter; view larger].
The images of “Grid Corrections” seen in the previous post reminded me of an earlier project, also by photographer Gerco de Ruijter, called “Cropped,” previously seen here back in 2012.
[Image: From “Cropped” by Gerco de Ruijter; view larger].
The images seen here are all satellite views of pivot irrigation systems, taken from Google Earth and cleaned up by de Ruijter for display and printing.
[Images: From “Cropped” by Gerco de Ruijter; view larger].
The resulting textures look like terrestrial LPs disintegrating into the landscape, or vast alien engravings slowly being consumed by sand—
[Image: From “Cropped” by Gerco de Ruijter; view larger].
—and they are, at times, frankly so beautiful it’s almost hard to believe these landscapes were not deliberately created for their aesthetic effects.
[Image: From “Cropped” by Gerco de Ruijter; view larger].
Granted, de Ruijter has color-corrected these satellite shots and pushed the saturation, but as metaphorical gardens of pure color and hue, the original pivotscapes are themselves already quite extraordinary.
[Image: From “Cropped” by Gerco de Ruijter; view larger].
For a few more examples of these—posted at a much-larger, eye-popping size—click through to the Washington Post or consider watching the original film, called “Crops,” here on BLDGBLOG.
[Images: From “Cropped” by Gerco de Ruijter; view larger].
[Previously: Grid Corrections].