This photography series explores abandoned locations to reveal how nature and time can turn an inhumane past into a brilliant and hopeful future. It contrasts nature’s permanence to human frailty.
Armed with a 4x5 film camera, French-Danish artist Kiritin Beyer explored North Brother Island and St. Joseph Island to reveal their secrets. From 1852 to 1952, St. Joseph served as a harsh penal colony in French Guyana. Meanwhile, in New York Bay, North Brother housed a tuberculosis sanatorium, at a time when the disease was often fatal. The long-ago abandoned buildings are now overgrown with vegetation. Their ghosts made room for the birds and animals who turned the former vortex of human suffering into their home.
Beyer’s series is part of “urbex” photography. Urbex (short for urban exploration) is an often illegal and dangerous activity where people explore abandoned buildings and other forgotten places. Besides the appeal of the unknown, urbex is about uncovering the layers of history that are hidden underneath new construction or vegetation.
*Online exhibit so on view anytime, anywhere.
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