Sky Captain

by John Vettese

photography

There's something magical about looking down at the earth from a couple thousand feet. All the high-strung clamor and confusion happening at ground level is lost; highway interchanges with bottleneck traffic curve around one another in the shape of patterned butterflies, and high-density suburban neighborhoods swell in dotted oblong shapes. Rural areas and large farm fields lie atop one another in bright circular bursts of color. Leaning out the window and watching the ground roll by can be one of the most entertaining parts of flying, and Adriel Heisey captures it ably in "From Above: Images of a Storied Land," showing at the UPenn Museum through Oct. 2.

An offshoot of his 2004 book of the same name, the exhibit features vivid color photos that show the Arizona-based Heisey using the majestic southwestern terrain as his muse as he sails the sky in a homebuilt plane he steers with his legs (it frees up his hand to use the camera). A flight over New Mexico's Santa Clara Indian reservation yields a shot of deep maroon pueblo huts juxtaposed against the bluish-white snow that surrounds them. In Arizona's Plomosa Mountains, Heisey comes across a circular dirt road surrounding the ancient "Fisherman Intaglio" formation depicting a hunter getting ready to spear his prey. Elsewhere he captures canyons, Aztec ruins and stark desert landscapes beneath billowing white clouds.

"From Above: Images of a Storied Land," July 16 through Oct. 2, University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, 3260 South St., 215-898-4000, www.museum.upenn.edu.

-- Respond to this article in our Forums -- click to jump there