IN SEARCH OF DOMINGUEZ & ESCALANTE
Photographing the 1776 Spanish Expedition through the Southwest
By Greg Mac Gregor
and Siegfried Halus
Foreword by Frances Levine / Essay by Joseph P. Sánchez
(Clothbound $50.00, 232 pages, 146 duotone photographs)
On July 29, 1776, Franciscan friars Francisco Atanasio Dominguez and Silvestre Velez de Escalante embarked on an expedition to seek an overland route from Santa Fe, New Mexico to Monterey, California. Although the Spaniards did not reach their final destination, the expedition is widely regarded as one of the great explorations in western U.S. history for its documentation of the land and Native peoples in the Four Corners. The group—including cartographer Don Bernardo Miera y Pacheco, Ute-speaking guides and the alcade (mayor) of Zuni— circumnavigated 1800 miles of unchartered territory never before seen by Europeans, an arduous five month trip documented in Escalante’s journal, a widely read historical account of the exploration.
More than two hundred years later Greg Mac Gregor and Siegfried Halus have created a remarkable visual record of the expedition. Using Escalante’s journal as their guide, the photographers followed the expeditionary route, circling through New Mexico, Colorado, Utah and Arizona, and documenting the frontier as first witnessed by the Spanish explorers on horseback.
The authors will be speaking as part of the Abiquiu Lecture Series,
When: Thursday, JUNE 2, 2011, at 7:00 p.m.
Admission: free.
For information: 505.685.0921. Abiquiu Inn, Building 21196, Hwy 84, Abiquiu, New Mexico 87510
About the Authors
Greg Mac Gregor and Siegfried Halus are renowned photographers and educators whose works have been exhibited internationally. Mac Gregoris professor emeritus of photography at California State University. He is the author of Overland: The California Emigrant Trail of 1841-1870 (University of New Mexico Press). Halus is former director of the art department of Santa Fe Community College and the author (with Marie Romero Cash) of Living Shrines: Home Alters of New Mexico (Museum of New Mexico Press). They both live in Santa Fe.
