Drift Alignment, Andrew O’Brien’s first book with SKYLARK Editions, asks us to consider the ways in which the sky is instrumentalized to exert control over the landscape and its inhabitants. Focusing on the complex and contested history of the US-Mexico border region, O’Brien oscillates between archival data, astrophotography, traces of immigration enforcement, and the iconic landscapes that contribute to our collective yet problematic notions of the romantic American West.

Across 68 pages and three gatefolds, Drift Alignment builds an intentionally fractured and poetic understanding of the linkages between the celestial navigation, colonial expeditions, contemporary research astronomy and GPS technology, and the thousands of migrants who have died as they trekked through the deserts of Southern Arizona over the past two decades.

• 68 pages with three double-gatefolds

• Offset printing on Munken Polar, softcover sewn binding with flaps

• Commissioned essay by Katie Flynn

• Designed by Studio Elana Schlenker

• Edition of 200 + 25 collector’s edition

Special Edition:

• Includes print by the artist

• Title: Anza Trail 2, 2018/2021

• Image size: 9.375” x 6.25” Sheet size: 11” x 6.75”

• Digital pigment print on 300gsm baryta paper

• Edition of 25

Andrew O’Brien is an Associate Professor in the Department of Art at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. O’Brien’s artistic practice draws from lived experience to examine the organization and perception of physical space — especially as it relates to landscape and the built environment. His work is informed by the history and symbolic potential of materials, as well as the shifting incarnations of the photographic image. Works range from experimental publications, to photographs, video, and installation.

He has exhibited widely, including at the Houston Center for Photography, The Center for Fine Art Photography in Fort Collins, Colorado, the West Gallery at California State University Northridge, and the Art Museum of Northern Illinois University. In 2021 O’Brien was named a Tennessee Arts Commission Individual Artist Fellow.