Noah Vaughn > DMO Galleries Welcomes Guest Photoblogger Noah Vaughn

 

This brief statement originally appeared at the now-defunct DMOGalleries.com on March 28, 2011.

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If there is a constant theme in my work, it is the effort to document places in transition. I’ve always been interested in Chicago’s architectural and industrial history. Unfortunately much of that history is being erased with bulldozers in the name of Urban Renewal or Gentrification. Photography has been a way for me to document that change. For years, that meant shooting abandoned and soon to be demolished buildings around Chicagoland—schools, factories, and hospitals. It amazed me that these places, often of architectural or historical significance, were left to rot.

As many of these places I’ve shot at are now are being demolished (and the minor trespassing involved with shooting such places has become more tiresome,) I’ve been turning my attention to the surrounding urban landscape, often derelict commercial districts that feel as desolate as some of the interior spaces I have shot. It’s been quite a challenge to find compelling images to shoot in these “non-places”, so different from the more traditionally picturesque “urban ruins” I’ve photographed. I’m not entirely sure where my work with these images is headed, but I’m excited about the possibilities.