Abandonia
Some of you will know that I have a certain fascination with abandoned things. Particularly buildings and shipwrecks but pretty much anything that humans used to use/wander around in/work in regularly - places and things that were so familiar and taken-for-granted that they feel a little magical and a little obscene when viewed in their abandoned state.
Toys left where they fell.
Books put down and never picked back up again.
Doors still standing half open from the last time the building would see use.
Things that were loved, used, needed, whatever, and which somebody once put down or walked away from, perhaps intending to be picked up again in half an hour, or tomorrow, with no idea that that object would lie there until long after the wallpaper was peeling off in long strips and trees had begun to grow in through the broken windows. Things that were so ordinary become extraordinary with time and abandonment.
Imagine leaves blowing in through your open bedroom window and never being swept up, ever again. Imagine birds flying freely through the place where the wall of your office used to be, and them being the only things that move there as the moss creeps towards the ceiling.
Anything that feels a bit like this? I am fascinated with it.
This being the case, I have 2 things for you. The first is this, which I found spectacular on several scales. Firstly that something like this stands abandoned and secondly that anyone, anywhere, thought it was a good idea to build it in the first place.
http://retardzone.com/2008/09/23/abandoned-mike-tyson-mansion-in-ohio/
Secondly, you may find these a little distressing actually - I certainly found them a little difficult when I first stumbled across them. They're Cernobyl. Modern Chernobyl. I like the second link best.
http://englishrussia.com/?p=293
http://funny.funnyoldplanet.com/strange/the-chernobyl-story-told-in-pictures/
Toys left where they fell.
Books put down and never picked back up again.
Doors still standing half open from the last time the building would see use.
Things that were loved, used, needed, whatever, and which somebody once put down or walked away from, perhaps intending to be picked up again in half an hour, or tomorrow, with no idea that that object would lie there until long after the wallpaper was peeling off in long strips and trees had begun to grow in through the broken windows. Things that were so ordinary become extraordinary with time and abandonment.
Imagine leaves blowing in through your open bedroom window and never being swept up, ever again. Imagine birds flying freely through the place where the wall of your office used to be, and them being the only things that move there as the moss creeps towards the ceiling.
Anything that feels a bit like this? I am fascinated with it.
This being the case, I have 2 things for you. The first is this, which I found spectacular on several scales. Firstly that something like this stands abandoned and secondly that anyone, anywhere, thought it was a good idea to build it in the first place.
http://retardzone.com/2008/09/23/abandoned-mike-tyson-mansion-in-ohio/
Secondly, you may find these a little distressing actually - I certainly found them a little difficult when I first stumbled across them. They're Cernobyl. Modern Chernobyl. I like the second link best.
http://englishrussia.com/?p=293
http://funny.funnyoldplanet.com/strange/the-chernobyl-story-told-in-pictures/