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The Tar Pits and the Problem of Scale

This image is intended to portray the sense of vertigo we felt when confronting this site: the remains of the Sattler Mine. This enormous mound of tar-covered rock was riven with folds and creases that seemed both pliable and ancient. Likewise, the tar confronted us as both a mundane thing and a thing of incredible historical weight. This image is striking in that no stable exterior object anchors the viewer, and it is at first difficult to comprehend distance or space. Through this spatial confusion, we endeavor to give the viewer a sense of the temporal stickiness and trickiness of this bitumen mound. Photograph by the Carpinteria Tar Pits team. Reproduced with permission of the photographers.