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Language has no weather: Field Notes from Unseen California is a limited-edition artists’ book featuring works by five women artists—Mercedes Dorame, Karolina Karlic, Tarrah Krajnak, Dionne Lee, and Aspen Mays—the inaugural research cohort of Unseen California (2021–23).

This book features the artists’ explorations in progress—their field notes—across media, generated from site work and ongoing dialogues. In this context, field notes are understood as fragments toward knowing, and these are embodied, subjective observations that might speculate and certainly express wonder, but also recognize that interpretation will often happen later, elsewhere.

The book was designed, printed and published by theretherenow, a risograph atelier founded in 2016 by Travis Shaffer, which specializes in the application of risograph printing to photography and photo-adjacent works. Language has no weather includes an essay from Karolina Karlic, cofounder of Unseen California, as well as an essay by Shana Lopes, Assistant Curator of Photography at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Also included are edited roundtable discussions with the artists moderated by Lopes.

The 160 page book is risograph printed in Copper, Black, Ivy, Light Lime, Mahogany, Mist, Scarlet, Sky, Steel, and Sunflower inks in an edition of 300 copies. The pages are 100% post-consumer material.

Unseen California is a multi-pronged arts research initiative utilizing the University of California Natural Reserve System through site specific research performed by a collaborative artist cohort, generating opportunities for field-based arts teaching and learning, public programming, and the creation of artworks. This publication has been supported by Unseen California, the Arts Research Institute at the University of California Santa Cruz, and The Riso Room at the MU School of Visual Studies.

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