Black-necked Stilts in Los Angeles - Hidden in Plain Sight

I designed and authored Black-Necked Stilts in Los Angeles - Hidden in Plain Sight from start to finish—every photograph, artwork, word, and piece of research is my own.

Most people in Los Angeles never look down. They drive above the river—a line of gray water pressed between concrete—and see nothing. The city has trained us to move, not to see. But beneath the freeways, life gathers quietly. If you stop long enough to watch, the stillness reveals movement: a thin-legged bird stepping through the shallows. The Black-necked Stilt lives where we would never think to look—under overpasses, in the shadows of traffic, in the thin places between water and concrete—often surrounded by trash, yet still staying. This book is about what’s happening directly below us, and about the conditions these birds are living in when so many “better” places have been damaged or disappeared.

I carried this idea into the book’s design—I wanted you to feel what you were reading about. An outline of the LA River runs throughout the book as a recurring motif. To break up the narrative, I created monoprints from trash and natural objects collected along the river. For the cover and front matter, I scanned the back of that artwork—bringing forward what’s usually hidden. Throughout the book, I layered images and partially concealed some beneath others to reflect what isn’t seen—until you decide to look.

Book + visual identity, 2025