The Californian photographer sublimates the vintage cars housed under the famous carports of modernist residences in Palm Springs in sunny compositions where past and present meet.

Dan Chavkin invites us to take a trip back in time, through the prism of carports, those carports attached to residential architecture. The point of departure is his love of Californian modernism and vintage cars.
It was through his encounters with a line of owners who contribute to the preservation of this emblematic trend that this California native decided to turn his attention to this essential element. " These carports evoke the idea of having a photogenic, glorious, fully restored vintage car as an occupant," explains Dan Chavkin. "They're synonymous. A symbiotic dance of architecture and automotive design."

His project took shape when, in Vista Las Palmas, he captured a silver 1971 Mercedes 280SL parked under the carport of Alexander House, designed by Dan Palmer & William Krisel in 1959. " I was immediately drawn to the way the post-and-beam architecture of the mansion complemented the car. "

BETWEEN AESTHETICS AND FUNCTIONALITY

In his superb series, Dan Chavkin plays with color associations and contrasts, shapes and lines, landscape and sky, materials and structures. In this selection, he immortalizes a bright red 1964 Corvette Sting Ray, parked in the Smith residence in Yucca Valley, built by Arthur Edward Gerpheide in 1961. Elsewhere, a 1959 Dodge Royal Lancer takes shelter from the sun in the Canyon View Estates complex, conceptualized by Dan Palmer and William Krisel in 1962.

Further on, the blue of a 1967 Simca 1000 coupé marries the clear sky, contrasting with the yellow of the Cree House, designed by Albert Frey in 1955. The same applies to the cobalt-blue 1969 Mercedes-Benz 280SL, which shelters under the palm trees of the James Logan Abernathy Residence, designed by William F. Cody in 1962.

Elsewhere, the 1966 Oldsmobile Toronado, installed in the Country Club Estates, designed by A. Quincy Jones in 1965, shows off its bodywork, with the desert in the background. The same can be said of the 1958 Oldsmobile Super 88 with its Floridian touch, housed in the Royal Hawaiian Estates, designed in 1960 by Donald Wexler and Richard Harrison. As for the Edsel Ranger, its shape cleverly plays with the curves and pine walls of a 1960 home built by architect Hugh Kaptur in Palm Springs.

LOVERS OF MODERNISM

A graduate of Pasadena's prestigious ArtCenter College of Design, he continues to magnify modernism in all its guises. Although he began his career in New York by taking celebrity portraits for major magazines, he returned to the Golden State to develop his passion. In the meantime, this mid-century modernist has collected furniture, objects, ceramics and works of art.

Over the past fifteen years, Dan Chavkin has published several books on this architectural paradise in Palm Springs, including Hand-In-Hand (on designers Evelyn and Jerome Ackerman), Unseen Midcentury Desert Modern (on the almost inaccessible buildings in the desert), Star Trek: Designing the Final Frontier (on the design of the original 1966 series), and Architectural Pottery (on the Californian company of the 1950s).

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