Raise Your Hand if You're Sick and Tired of RUIN PORN

[BrushStart]

Okay, I get it, we've got abandoned buildings, many are historical and have neat architecture, but enough is enough. If I get one more email or FB post linking me to a blog, photo-documentary, flickr account, or some other online picture-sharing website, I am going to scream.

It was interesting at first, but now it's just cliche. Why do people feel the need to travel to Detroit, break into derelict buildings, and take pictures of scraps of paper, old furniture, piles of wood, and other worthless garbage from 50 years ago? Try looking in your grandmother's basement and you're likely to find equally interesting junk.

I can understand why people are fascinated with Detroit and its ruins, but seriously, is every photographer on a quest to make a coffee table book of Detroit's crumbling buildings? Likewise, is every journalist on a quest to inform the world about Detroit's blight? It's not like there was some major calamity here. People just moved out past 8 Mile and built new shit. That's it... They left. It rotted. End of story.

There are so many more interesting things to photograph in Detroit these days. How about taking some pictures of a building being rehabbed? That takes true imagination. And, what's the deal with these people from Europe coming here? You live on a continent with ruins that date back to before the time of Christ! Photograph that stuff. Go take a picture of Pompeii, find King Arthur's castle, have you seen Chernobyl?

The reason I'm really tired of all the ruin porn is because it only captures one side of Detroit. Michigan Central Station is a single reflection of Detroit. Another reflection would be the Book Cadillac, the Fort Shelby, or the thousands of homes and buildings that are not abandoned, have never been abandoned, or have recently been restored. Yet, nobody seems interested in that stuff. How many photographers will be storming the doors of Broderick Tower once its renovated to its magnificent beauty? Don't they all say, "What a shame, it must'a been gorgeous back in the day" as they flicker away? Well, soon it will be, but then they won't care anymore.

Also, don't tell me that you are recording the history of Detroit. That history has been recorded by at least a hundred people already. You are not an "archaeologist." At best, you are a ruin pornographer, and, no, I will not be buying your coffee table book.