There is a difference between abandoned and empty. The difference as I see (and photograph) is hope. Abandoned means no one will come back. Empty means there is no one here right now. I don’t like abandoned. When we were in Alkabo, North Dakota I had an opportunity to photograph the interior of an abandoned house. I made a photograph of the outside of the house to “set the scene.” Then I headed inside.
About forty years earlier an immigrant bachelor died suddenly. No one knew his next of kin and there was no family. The town buried him and just closed the door to his house. The door was still unlocked on the day we were there. Upon entering, we were transported back to the day he died. Clothes hung in the closet, unopened mail sat on the desk and magazines lay on a table. This place was abandoned. I could not photograph in this place. This photograph set the scene for a project that never happened.
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