Photos of the American West

Fine art photographs from the western United States of America; subjects include architecture, advertising, historic amusement parks, landscape, Native American rock art, neon signs, wildlife, and more. With over 50 full-page color photos on high-quality gloss paper by Eric Thome, from little-known locations to famous sites.

Journey around the American West (without the dangers of backcountry travel) through over 50 full-page color photographs on high-quality gloss paper by Eric Thome, a fine artist. Photographs range from western cities and towns to remote ghost towns (in the process of vanishing from existence) and wilderness. Historic locales in this volume are from California, Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, and Washington. Photograph subjects include advertising signs, automobiles, cultural sites, early 1900s amusement parks, ephemera, historic architecture, landscapes, mid-century neon, mines, rock art, ruins, sculptures, wildlife, and more. Eras of the subject matter photographed in this book span from North American Pre-Columbian to the 20th Century. Native American subjects include petroglyphs, pictographs, and Ancestral Pueblo architecture. Other cultural photos vary from a Basque aspen arborglyph (these are disappearing as the trees reach the end of their lifespan) to San Francisco's Chinatown.

Eric Thome grew up outside of Baltimore, Maryland. Eric was accepted into Maryland Institute College of Art as a Graphic Design major, but the Foundation (Freshman) year also required art history, sculpture, color theory, drawing, and painting classes. Eric moved to Portland, Oregon, and transferred to the Pacific Northwest College of Art the following year. After a graphic design internship during his junior year, Eric changed his major to Inter-Media Art (taking printmaking, photography, and video classes). Eric started with black-and-white photography courses in the darkroom at PNCA. Eric began photographing what was remaining at ghost town sites in 2005. These vanishing places fueled Eric's drive to document the remains of the American West as artistically as possible, despite potential constraints of a location (such as modernity, junk or other non-historic distractions). Natural lighting, weather conditions, wildfire smoke, and other issues also affect on-location shooting. Beginning with his Portland darkroom days, Eric was also interested in photographing historic buildings, signs, and sites from living towns and cities (which are also being vandalized and disappearing). Eric has been interested in Native American cultures, arts and activism since his early teenage years. Eric has traveled to places he finds exciting and awe-inspiring, taking him through more beautiful scenery than he can photograph during thoroughly planned trips.