Tapestry: Thursday, July 14th, 2022
Beginning, 2022
Our Graves, 2022
Today is the first day I have seen the Tapestry Project in person. Over the last few days, I have been editing the city’s documents on the project on my google drive. Days of editing, filing, sorting and organizing have weighed on me especially with the dry desert heat continuously filling my room. Last night I decided to take a pause on the website side of the project and see if the breaking of ground had begun. Since the city of Hesperia does not communicate well with its residents, there has not been a statement or a social media post regarding the start of the project. I decided this morning that I would visit previous locations that I have photographed to get an idea of where they were beginning. I knew that phase one of the project would begin around the eastern side of the city referred to by residents as “The Mesa”.
As I drove towards The Mesa with fellow photographer and friend, Angel Vandrer, I decided to park on the side of the road between Ranchero Road x Santa Fe and Ranchero Road x Danbury. Here I got a good view of the houses along the hillside and the natural landscape behind it. This landscape should change and eventually become part of the 15,000 new homes in the city of Silverwood. I then took a multi-photo panorama on my 35mm Olympus OM10 to document the eventual loss of that environment.
The first location that we arrived at was on The Mesa in a field near Farmington Street. We didn't see any sign of the Tapestry project but we stayed to photograph the abandoned red plastic barricades and other construction supplies left behind from an old construction site that has been turned into a makeshift BMX course. Plywood and barricades were put together to make a ramp and silt socks were moved to make the course. There were no longer any bicycle marks on the dirt which meant that once again the space had been abandoned and left to be reclaimed only by the environment. We then drove away from the field and I noticed a street was a mound of dirt with a single traffic cone on each side. This imagery reminded me of an unfortunate grave and set a tone for the rest of the day.
As we continued to the second location, Krystal Elementary, off of Farmdale x Krystal, there were not any signs of construction but there was an orange silt fence surrounding the native desert landscape foreshadowing the eventual grating and removal of all of the plants and animals occupying the space. Though there wasn't any construction in this location I knew we were close. Right down the street is Ranchero Middle School which has been talked about a few times in the phase one reports of the project.
We drove further down Ranchero road and passed the middle school to see a long flattened expansive landscape rumbled by large metal machinery clearing and sedating it with massive arms and countless gallons of water. This was the beginning of Tapestry.
As I looked over the space documenting the change occurring before me, I felt distant eyes consume me. A local resident peered through half-closed windows to watch me as I watched the construction workers as they build a new town. Another resident left his house to watch from behind his truck as I walked parallel to the fence that had been made to keep others out. Every ten feet there was a sign of “No Trespassing” emphasizing the feeling that I should not be here. Other signs posted were those informing the public of dust risks and who to call if there was too much dust in the air. There wasn't real information to give about this project. Especially because the signs left referred to the project as “Silverwood Phase I” and not as Tapestry which was the name the residents knew it as when they voted against the project.
I continued to walk around the edge of the property until I found myself on the side of the middle school. A narrow and seemingly hidden road separated the two. I walked down the road seeing the expansive space get larger and larger. There was even more large machinery following each other as if they were ducklings chasing their mother back to their nest. They moved slowly making sure not to miss a single inch as they tracked across the newly made plains.
I took a moment to photograph the trucks and felt the urge to move closer. Separating me and they were a barbed wire fence followed by the same orange silt fence as earlier. As I inched closer, I saw beyond the fence laid dead Joshua Trees accompanied by random debris and tread marks left in the overturned dirt as they ravaged past.
As I pulled away I felt the warm but gentile sting of the barbed wire on my skin as I began to think about the constructed grave I saw earlier today. We create symbolic graves for those needing more on The Mesa but refuse to protect those that eventually will need the graves. Tapestry is here.
James M Dailey
