Elevated Roadway, Presidio of San Francisco

About the Photographer

Gomes, Lyle

American, b. 1954

For nearly sixteen years, Lyle Gomes traveled to many locations across North America and Europe creating photographs for his series Imagining Eden: Connecting Landscapes (1989 - 2005). Inspired by Czech photographer, Josef Sudek, Gomes manipulated his 4x5 field camera to capture panoramic images. The resulting photographs are expansive views of cemeteries, parks, gardens, golf courses, and military bases, all possess a haunting light and fog. Imagining Eden captures a sense of perpetual loss and near recovery as Gomes searches for a connection with nature.

Lyle Gomes completed a BA in Art (1978) and a MA in Art (1980) from San Francisco State University. Gomes’ long-term project Imagining Eden: Connecting Landscapes was published by the University of Virginia Press (2005). The book includes sixty photographs of locations in Europe and North America. His work is included in the permanent collections of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris, Dumbarton Oaks Collection, Washington D.C, Cantor Center at Stanford University, the Santa Barbara Museum of Art and the Museum of Photographic Arts, among others. He is the recipient of a Fulbright Scholar Award (1998) and a Rockefeller Foundation residency, Bellagio, Italy (2002). He has served as the head of the photography program at College of San Mateo since 1984.