The Ironic Co-Existence of Things Natural, Nuclear : Art: Photographer Patrick Nagatani discusses his latest series of pictures and collages at the Irvine Fine Arts Center.

“I’m interested in how a pueblo reservation can sit right next to a weapons plant, how I can watch a golden eagle flying while F-111 D (fighter jets) practice bombing runs,” said photographer Patrick Nagatani, who discussed his latest series here Thursday night.

“Nuclear Enchantment” deals with “the historical and contemporary aspects of nuclear information in New Mexico,” where the first atom bomb was exploded, Nagatani, 45, said. He’s also fascinated by the ironies he has observed since moving there in 1987 to teach art at the University of New Mexico at Albuquerque. He’s now an associate professor of art.

The sun-drenched state boasts ideal weather conditions, dazzling ski resorts, a famous artist colony and abundant American Indian culture, he told an audience of about 10 at the Irvine Fine Arts Center. (The center canceled a two-day workshop with Nagatani, to have ended today, for lack of sufficient pre-registration.)

But it’s also “the birthplace of the Nuclear Age,” he said. New Mexico, he added, “has three military bases, two of the three weapons labs in the country and is a rich uranium area.”

Probably best-known for his fabricated photographs of apocalyptic, nuclear annihilation he created with former longtime collaborator painter Andree Tracey, Nagatani also features situations constructed for the camera in his new 40-picture series of 17- by 22-inch prints. (The photos were to be exhibited at Orange Coast College this month, but Nagatani canceled the show because it wasn’t ready. He hopes to have the exhibit together for a showing at Los Angeles’ Koplin Gallery in April.)

In one collage, which superimposes inanimate objects over a real landscape, an angry kachina doll that represents an animal god dances above a vast, contaminated riverbed where dead sheep (plastic toys) lie.

Other tableaux depict real pueblo villages, one nestled beside a cemetery and uranium mining ground, a military base stockpiled with weapons (some toy, some real) and several nuclear test sites.

Nagatani also includes painted sets and people in his pictures, and often applies color to his pictures. He used the latter technique, as well as a characteristic gallows humor, to give a glow to “hot” children emerging from a dip in “Radium Springs,” denoted by a real road sign.

“In this invisible spectrum of radiation, I create the visible,” Nagatani said.

Despite his subject matter and treatment, Nagatani said he “does not want to ram you up against a wall” and force-feed viewers with anti-nuclear statements. “I’m interested in the irony of it. I’m not saying nuclear activity is bad--New Mexico couldn’t survive without a nuclear economy. That’s a fact of life. I just want people to think about what they’re looking at.”