So, summer is over and the school year has finally begun so I am able to use the view camera. During the summer I continued exploring the idea of a contemporary landscape with an emphasis on the representation of industry, voyeurism and a bit of surveillance. I spent some time shooting in the northeast part of Philadelphia, (primarily Kensington and Fishtown) at night. The photographing is happening at night because that is the time when the landscapes seem the most isolated. At night there are no people around and the buildings are empty- this is when they really come alive and you can truly experience the landscapes of Kensington and Fishtown. There is also something about the landscape emerging out of blackness that is really important to me because I want the image to exist as an individual moment instead of a component of an entire block, street, or even a city. In this way i suppose there is a kind of personification going on. Anyway. Here are a few photos:
Because these locations are in a shitty area I find the photos are taken best with a small digital camera, no flash and a fast bike or a friend's car. These aren't photos I can take with the view camera, sadly because its just to great a risk with an expensive camera that i don't even own. I guess the question now, is why? Well, I think the industrial landscape has become important to philadelphia, especially put in context to the specific area i am photographing. As we know, the northern part of philly is changing, and its happening very fast. This area is becoming heavily populated with young artists and musicians, galleries and organizations, coffee houses, thrift store, etc. The question is, what stays and what goes. With all this new culture theres no telling what the neighborhoods really were about. There is also the stigma of the "unsafe neighborhood" which is much less a stigma and just a reality in some parts more than others. The point however, is not the risk (if any) that is being taken to make the image. There is some kind of subtle peacefulness that i found in the outskirts of the city, the endless landscape of nameless factories, industrial establishments and there fences, dumpsters, shitty paint-jobs and broken signs. I feel that maybe its important to pay some kind of homage to what else these newly populated areas have, or had beyond the coffee shops and galleries (which are great too).
