For 2024 Paris Photo, Large Glass presents a solo show of works by American photographer Mark Ruwedel. We spotlight Ruwedel’s on-going project Los Angeles: Landscapes of Four Ecologies (since 2014) with the title making reference to British architectural critic Reyner Banham’s 1971 book, Los Angeles: The Architecture of Four Ecologies.

For three decades, Mark Ruwedel has photographed American deserts and wild spaces that bear traces of human intervention: abandoned remains of early railway lines, brightly sinister nuclear test sites, ruined desert homes outside Los Angeles. "I have come to think of the land as being an enormous historical archive," he wrote in 1996. "I am interested in revealing the narratives contained within the landscape, especially those places where the land reveals itself as being both an agent of change and the field of human endeavour."

For the Project, Ruwedel has identified four overlapping landscape 'systems': The Rivers, The Eastern Edge, The Hills and Canyons, and The Western Edge. His work captures the dynamic landscapes of the greater LA metropolitan area, shaped by floods, fires, earthquakes and landslides; a place overwritten by industry, irrigation, urban planning and abiding fantasies about authentic wilderness.

Mark Ruwedel has won numerous awards for this outstanding work, including the Scotiabank Photography Award and a Guggenheim Fellowship (both 2014). He was shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize (2019) and for the Prix Pictet (2021). His work is included in major museum collections including those of the Los Angeles County Art Museum (Los Angeles), The Metropolitan Museum (New York), National Gallery of Art (Washington), The National Gallery (Canada); Stichting Foundation (Brussels), Maison Européenne de la Photographie (Paris), Tate Modern and the Victoria and Albert Museum (London).