Gary Nabhan
You might know ethnobotanist and author Gary Paul Nabhan from his work founding Native Seeds/SEARCH, the massive seed bank that preserves all manner of indigenous plant variants to ensure future genetic diversity as corporate farming operations embrace monoculture. You might know him from his work as science director at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, or his work at the UA s Southwest Center, or his contributions to the annual Agave Festival at Hotel Congress. In short, Gary has left a big footprint in our natural world.
This week, we re proud to present an excerpt from an essay about how he discovered his love of the richness of desert flora and fauna. It s the lead essay in a new book Nabhan has edited:
Longtime arts writer Margaret Regan returns to our pages this week with a look at Etherton Gallery s latest show, El Sueño, an exhibit of photographs by Tom Kiefer. An Ajo resident, Kiefer worked as a janitor at a Border Patrol station and collected migrant belongings that had been tossed in the trash by agents. The objects formed the basis of Kiefer s work in El Sueño, a haunting show that also includes work by Alejandro Cartigena and a selection of Mexican folk retablos. Regan will also moderate a virtual talk with Kiefer, author Francisco Cantú, migrant rights advocate Dora Rodriquez and poet and author Jose Javier Zamora on Saturday night. See her story for details about how you can tune in.