Ancient Dwellings of the Southwest

Archaeologists say that 1,000 years ago more people lived in the Four Corners region of the Southwest than live there now.

Today visitors to the region see the empty dwellings and pueblos from that time, but not the lively cultures that once built them.

Ancient Dwellings of the Southwest puts the people back in these places in three dimensions. Hohokam ball players leap and dive in the ballcourt at Casa Grande Ruins in Arizona; the reader moves women at Mesa Verde in Colorado to watch them grind corn or pulls back the bow of a hunter at Bandelier in New Mexico.

The buildings at all of these sites vibrate with life thanks to the artist’s conceptualizing of how they looked at the height of their use.

The five-story Pueblo Bonito at Chaco Canyon unfolds out of the page while the dwellings at Bandelier and Mesa Verde nestle in the shadow of the cliffs.

See how these places looked when people lived, worked, and played in them.