AMERICAN SAMPLER I: A Field Guide

2020, digital and analog capture

Scroll over the image for captions.


During the last year of the Trump administration, I was living in a rural area of Joshua Tree, California. As Black Lives Matter, death counts, environmental disasters, and politics filled the news, I documented the minutiae of daily life with even greater attention to detail. By pairing these images with U.S. and world news headlines, my aim is to make visible the connection between the mundane and the catastrophic and to encourage viewers to think about everyday experiences as radical political acts.

January 12, 2020 [Seven days in January: How Trump Pushed U.S. and Iran to the Brink of War]
January 21, 2020. [First U.S. case of potentially deadly Chinese coronavirus confirmed in Washington state]
January 28, 2020. [Maryland cop charged for fatally shooting handcuffed man in squad car]
February 19, 2020. [Jury starts deliberations in Weinstein rape trial]
March 7,2020 [People are panic-buying meat, toilet paper … and Pelotons?]
March 16, 2020 [U.S. economy slides into the monetary black hole]
March 20, 2020 [A torrent of job losses threatens to overwhelm the U.S. economy]
March 25, 2020. [Dow posts biggest gain since 1933]
April 13, 2020. [Fauci says earlier coronavirus lockdown would have saved lives]
April 26, 2020. [Global coronavirus deaths surpass 200,000]
April 27, 2020. [Top E.R. doctor who treated virus patients dies by suicide]
May 18, 2020 [Fed Chair Says Economic Recovery May ‘Stretch’ Through End of 2021]
June 6, 2020. [Buffalo police team resigns to support officers who pushed over older man]
July 2, 2020. [What do you do when extremism comes for the Hawaiian shirt?]
July 29, 2020. [U.S. records highest one-day coronavirus death toll since May]
August 18, 2020. [Postmaster General agrees to testify as fears mount over USPS changes that could threaten election]
September 1, 2020. [California continues to burn]
September 3, 2020. [Germany says Soviet-era nerve agent used to poison Navalny]
September 8, 2020 [El Dorado Fire in California started by gender reveal party]
October 7, 2020 [Trump Abruptly Ends Stimulus Talks After Fed Chair Urges Economic Support]
November 4, 2020 [As America Awaits a Winner, Trump Falsely Claims He Prevailed]
November 16, 2020. [Georgia's Secretary of State says Sen. Graham asked him to "look hard" for ballots to throw out]






© all content, Mary Addison Hackett, 2023