Urban Void

Free Offer, Oak Knoll & Research, Austin

This is not a happy image; it’s downright gloomy, depressing, a little sinister. The car dealer that was here has shut up shop and left nothing behind but the barren forecourt; its a sign of the hard times.

“Covert” is the threatening name on the building across the street, easier to see if you click on the image for a larger version. At a still larger magnification “Wrong Way” is legible in the near central flash of red. Three white cars fly past in formation, hurrying to leave the frame.

A rule of thumb when using a wide angle lens is to make sure that there is something interesting in the foreground, close to the camera; something to catch the mind. I choose this picture as it stands, with its harsh angles and parallels, its urban tundra of tarmac and concrete, tire marks, hovering clouds, discouraging words, repeating and repeating toward some distant vanishing point.

Humanity is missing; this is a post-rapture landscape without the rapture.