Who am I?

I am A C Auriemma.  A California native, I grew up in Los Angeles and went to high school near Rochester New York.  Since then, with a few notable exceptions, I have lived in the San Francisco Bay Area.

What do I do?

I am a photographer and trained mechanical engineer living in Oakland California.  I create pictures of beautiful shapes from the natural and human-made world that might be commonly overlooked.

Between 2014 and 2017 I focused on sand.  I have observed and contemplated beach patterns at Pt Reyes National Seashore, north of San Francisco, and Buccaneer Beach, north of San Diego. I watched how the tides and winds cyclically create and destroy unique and, at the same time, predictable patterns and forms made of sand grains.  Out of this chaotic and recursive firmament, structures and captivating beauty emerge at random.  Of these creations, tongues and grooves are two of many kinds of features.   Tongues and Grooves, and other Evidence of Flow is my collection documenting what I have seen in the sand.

I invite you to enjoy and appreciate these forms and the fleeting and random nature of beauty in our lives and on our planet

To start your sand odyssey, click on the menu icon in the top-left corner and choose one of the nine pattern categories.