This Desert Hides Nothing

In 2004, Stephen Strom and [the late essayist] Ellen Meloy spent two intense days exploring mutual passions and their idiosyncratic ways of addressing them. Swept up in the excitement of shared perceptions and the possibilities for collaboration, they decided to experiment with making a book.

The contrasts in their work—Strom’s quiet minimalism and Meloy’s exuberant layering, the meditative intent evinced by Strom and the wit and exaggeration with which Ellen leavens her own seriousness, the subtlety of Strom’s colors and forms and the heightened sensuality in Meloy’s descriptions—only spice their mutual sensibilities. Learn more about the book created from this portfolio.