Why do I like abandoned places so much?
This question was asked on the
abandonedplaces
community today. Well, "why do you explore abandoned places" was the exact phrasing. Though I do not explore so much anymore, the obsession has only grown. I had to agree with several of the responses in the comments: I share the same love of solitude and silence, and aesthetic appreciation of the decay, transgressive freedom and exploration, etc.
I think on a deeper level, I feel like the abandoned site is what is real to me - as if all the built-up, functioning areas of the world are unreal, waiting for the other shoe to drop so to speak, to fall into their natural state: empty, crumbling, quiet. That what we think is solid and secure and functional is a kind of lie that we cling to to avoid having to deal with the reality of the failure of our civilization. There is some discussion of a kind of new kind of wilderness - not in a sense of pristine, but contaminated, overgrown, feral landscapes. Certainly I love the reclaimation by nature with mold and vines and insects and animals - it feels like a kind of justice.
I think growing up in the early 80's with a near-continual threat of a nuclear apocalypse has something to do with it. And a coming of age in Halifax during the recession of the early 90's, with tons of empty waterfront and decommissioned military buildings to explore. I don't do so much anymore, but I still read lots of JG Ballard, Samuel Delauney, Cormac Macarthy, the Strugatsky brothers, etc. Not to mention Tarkovsky's Stalker. I think that has been one of my biggest cultural reference points in my life. The last book I read, the House of Leaves, did not deal with the ruin in particular, but the spirit of disorientation, obsessive exploration and a vertigenously shifting environment that characterizes the relation to the abandoned site, and perhaps the world to come.
A contemporary philosopher from the UK, Dylan Trigg, has written a very interesting book called The Aesthetics of Decay, that delves into the need for the ruin, and the presence it has had, romantic and otherwise througout western history. There is also a wonderful essay by Dr Helen Armstrong called "Time, Derelictiion and Beauty: An Argument for Landscapes of Contempt" .
The posts on this site are at times incredibly beautiful and poignant, especially the ones from Russia. (And Japan, for the overgrowth.)
The image above is from a visit to the Salton Sea, which I cannot recommend enough.