With the water rushing by the windows and into the house through every possible hole there is little time to prioritize what valuables to take with you. Many people were lucky enough to evacuate to safe and dry spaces and avoid the storm that prompted this diaspora. This storm has already taken the lives of 90 and left 7.5 million others without electricity. With the cleanup effort in full force people are starting to find strange objects, anything from a mannequin that drifted several blocks to albums of family photographs.
Before super storm Sandy brought devastation to the east coast there was another type of storm brewing over an American city that destroyed it from the inside out. The economic downturn in Detroit caught the attention of Italian photographers Arianna Arcara and Luca Santese. They accumulated hundreds of notes and photographs left behind in the abandoned houses strewn through Detroit’s bitter landscape of forgotten dreams. Using the materials at hand they designed a book to tell the story and exhibited the work in the US and Europe.
The mystery of the owner’s and the overwhelming sense of emotional neglect make the subjects of these photos shielded from judgment from a viewer who has the luxury of casual acquaintance. For those struggling to live inside a city that has a 47% rate of functional illiteracy these pictures were the only link to a past they can’t write about for themselves.
The case of Detroit is one of violence and squalor but that isn’t too far from the reality of present day post-Sandy when people are fighting at gas stations and neglecting neighbors to provide for their own needs. I’m not claiming that extraordinary efforts haven’t been made to procure safety for those affected but I am saying that New York and the east coast have the potential to create a great project from their misery.
Found Photos Post-Sandy
As the recovery effort spills from individual homes and into the streets it is inevitable that people will start finding photographs of strangers swept upstream in the storm. Even with websites where photos can be listed and claimed this process could take months, and for homeowners who are more concerned with insurance claims than pictures this process could seem tedious. So perhaps there is a chance to save these damaged memories and reincarnate them into something beautiful that tells the story of those it came from.
As more and more journalist flood into the city to cover the changing landscape of the big apple they are also going to stumble over debris that are ‘worth a thousand words’. I just hope they can apply to same silent dignity and respect that Arcara and Santese provided post-recession Detroit and that something beautiful will grow out of the lost remnants of stranger’s memories and a tragedy whose national repercussions have yet to be determined.
Scarlett Goes Midwest 