Delicate Arch, Edge On

Delicate Arch is the most famous rock in Utah — a freestanding span on the rim of a slickrock bowl, with the La Sal Mountains behind it. Almost every photograph of it is taken from the front, through the opening. This one is not.

Photographed June 2003, seen edge on. From the side the arch loses its window and reads as a solid column or goblet of stone standing alone against the sky. It's the landmark stripped of the view that made it famous — the same rock, made strange.