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Detroit ruin porn still is a thing, and not just for UK wildlife photographer David Yarrow and other foreign visitors.
A suburban "fine art" exhibitor unashamedly snaps her Canon inside, above and in front of the city's structural relics.
Alanna St. Laurent, a 47-year-old Ferndale resident, displayed prints of Detroit decay last weekend at the annual Birmingham Street Art Fair, the Oakland Press reports.
She "finds gold in Detroit’s abandoned buildings," writes freelancer Stephanie Preweda, who adds:.
Exploring every corner of the city, she has photographed and climbed to the top of every abandoned building she’s found, searching for the lost beauty within.
Alanna St. Laurent's website home page.
At her site, the largely self-taught photographer says she looks "for the beauty that is still there in these old abandoned, neglected buildings."
The details, the light, textures, colors, it's all beautiful to me. And thankfully, others think so too since they purchase my work at art fairs and artist markets that I have participated in these past four years. . . .
It dawned on me that what I was doing by photographing abandoned buildings in Detroit was living out my [childhood] dream of archeology – digging around in old buildings forgotten by time and people, looking for interesting scenes and artifacts to photograph.
The suburbanite, who grew up in Troy and earned a psychology degree at Central Michigan University in 1992, was an academic advisor at the College for Creative Studies when she enrolled in a photo class in 2007 that sparked a career change to freelance photography and workshop leader. St. Laurent also has photographed lofts and homes for Airbnb owners, her LinkedIn profile says.
St. Laurent is a technically accomplished shooter who clearly has a sharp sense of composition, mood, lighting and texture.
At her About page, she tries to justify the methods of abandoned building photography -- which involves trespassing -- by framing her intent this way:
My purpose in photographing Detroit, not only its abandonment but also its historical buildings, is to document the current state of the city and to bring awareness to the fact that Detroit is not down and out but is slowly making a comeback. I already have many images of buildings that have been demolished or burned down, and that is important, to have that history of what used to be.
Yet her website, Facebook business page and the Oakland Press coverage also display a tone of giddiness and boastfulness at times.
Alanna St. Laurent: "The details, the light, textures, colors, it's all beautiful to me." (LinkedIn photo)
She describes evading a Packard Plant security vehicle to enter a warehouse at that east-side complex, and also gushes about special-effect lighting at an empty Detroit armory. "While abandoned buildings are interesting enough unto themselves, light painting adds a whole new level of interest," posts the relative newcomer to urban photography.
Another site post describes wandering through the Park Avenue Hotel with "one of my urban exploring friends" a few months before its July demolition. They entered through "a small opening at the base of the building, perhaps three feet wide. He mentioned we should go since the building will most likely not stay open for very long."
This week's newspaper article says:
One of her favorite buildings to photograph is the Fisher Body Plant 21. [St.] Laurent says it encompasses everything she looks for in an abandoned building — color, graffiti, texture and history.
[St.] Laurent says many of the abandoned buildings are more colorful than you’d ever imagine, even with graffiti out of the picture. The color floods from rust, peeling paint and views of the city.
At Facebook, an illustrated August post shows how "the rain we just had [creates] some great reflections out there in some of these buildings." A July post showing a wrecked ballroom says: "One of my favorite finds -- abandoned furniture! The colors are awesome."
In other words: Broken windows and roof gaps that let in rain, as well as wrecked chairs and sofas, are good things for a Canon-carrying "urban explorer."
We don't mean to single out this professional for doing what's done by plenty of others who are much younger. Her story is presented as fresh evidence that photographic skill and a sensitive eye aren't necessarily accompanied by sensitivity to the subtext of statements about how "it's all beautiful to me."
But hey, what do we know? Unframed photos are the closest we've come to seeing the awesome colors, great reflections, beautiful rust and peeling paint of Detroit's abandoned buildings.
