Boston Basin
In Boston, I was interested in capturing a better sense of the basin that the city is built upon. As I investigated the rock below the city, I wanted to see the outer edges of the basin. I stepped back, so to speak, until I gained a view of the entire basin from a geologic perspective. The result is this image that represents sixteen miles of width and four-and-a-half miles in depth. The view is looking west. From left to right, it stretches from Quincy and Milton, through Dorchester, and South Boston to the downtown Boston area and inner harbor near the center, and then through Charlestown, Everett, and Malden, ending in Stoneham.
The subsurface bedrock portion of the Boston Basin image was created by first conducting geologic research in libraries. A geologic cross section on the Geologic Map of Massachusetts (E-an Zen, et. al. 1983) provided the framework to begin constructing the image. Representative rock exposures were located and photographed by traveling throughout the Greater Boston area with the aid of geologic bedrock maps and field trip guides.
The photographs were then transferred to the computer and placed in sequences to represent the underlying structure and rock formations. The surface features have been increased in scale in relation to the underlying rock so that we can see them and contemplate the relation between our everyday world and the earth that is its foundation.