In Search of Circle Z

143-page paperback / 8" x 8" / ISBN 9781589881808 / Publication Date: 10/17/2023 

"Dry’s keen visual sensibility propels her graceful and intriguing chronicle . . . She introduces James Perry Wilson, a master diorama landscape painter, and analyzes the power of those mesmerizing museum displays and her own wondrously soothing memoryscapes. Dry has channeled the 'magical presence' of both into drawings, photographs, and her own small dioramas, visual works that deepen this unique and evocative inquiry into perception and 'how images work for us.'”
—Booklist

When Constance Dry began to experience spontaneous mental images brought on by chronic migraine disease, she termed them “memoryscapes.” These memoryscapes were inspired by the landscape of Circle Z Ranch where Dry has spent time since childhood, and they have helped alleviate the pain of migraine.

In In Search of Circle Z, Dry explores the relationship between these unbidden images and habitat dioramas, specifically those in the American Museum of Natural History in New York. Through a series of photographs, drawings, and mini-dioramas, she illustrates their similarity and explains how her internal imagery works to provide a place of refuge from pain and a source of new experiences each time they are viewed.

Illustrated with color photographs throughout. 

Constance Dry, trained as a documentary filmmaker in visual anthropology, has had a lifelong fascination with still and moving images. Her company, Ethnovision, specialized in work for government and nonprofits. No longer able to practice filmmaking due to migraine disease, she has discovered drawing. She attended Mt. Holyoke College, Temple University, and the Graduate Institute of St. John's College. She lives in Philadelphia.