草木勝

KUSAKI MASARU

From 1989 to 1998, I made several trips to photograph national parks scattered across the American Midwest. Each shooting destination was hundreds of kilometers apart, and within my limited itinerary, I drove relentlessly on the interstate every single day. American rental cars back then already came equipped with cruise control, so drowsiness naturally became the biggest problem. There were days when I couldn't find suitable lodging and just drove endlessly down the highway at night. In the U.S., highways between towns have no lighting whatsoever, so moonless nights can become complete darkness. On such nights, the area beyond the road illuminated by the car's headlights was utter blackness, creating the illusion of a pitch-black wall looming ahead. These are photos of roadside gas stations and motels taken when I stopped to rest. Amidst a journey filled with breathtaking scenery, the utterly ordinary sights glimpsed from random roadside stops struck me, as a foreigner, as profoundly American.