A Mundane World: The Other Face of Palm Springs

Lauren Ray currently attends Emily Carr University where she is majoring in photography. Using whichever 35mm point and shoot or film SLR she can get her hands on, she uses flash and colour to create sensations of the mundane. She approaches the visual world with a candid mind, combining vulnerability, humour, personal experience and formal decision-making in her work. Lauren is a relentless documentarian with a distrust of memory and a vigorous eye; her photographs are moments archived and enshrined with the same detailed wonder that she affords them in the day-to-day.

 

This photo essay compiles images of that mundane side of Palm Spring, a city normally glamorised by its beautiful mid-century modern architecture and desert views. The work here exposed has been gathered over the course of three years. “The desert is such a special place for its beige mountains, its stucco pastel holiday homes, blooming cactus gardens. There are things which were once saturated that have become faded by sun-drenched days & there are ladies in sparkly visors that lounge by crystal blue pools. There is a strange feeling, both supernatural and sentimental, that is impossible to deny.”, Lauren explains about her relationship with the city.

 

The other side of Palm Springs, the mundane, common and almost not good looking side is what Lauren has dared to explore and the results are in this fascinating visual report. Lauren has allowed us to see one of the most famous cities in the world by its quotidian appearance. Follow Lauren Ray on Instagram to see more.