Lost America
Author: Simon Sellars • Sep 26th, 2007 •Category: America, Ballardosphere, photography, urban decay
- Above: ‘The Staircase’, by Troy Paiva, 2005. ‘Byron Hot Springs Hotel, Byron California. Built in the 1930s, used for POW interrogations during WWII. Abandoned for decades, many say it’s quite haunted. It IS noisy at night in there . . . Night,full moon, dark interior, blue and red-gelled strobe flash. Canon 20D.’
The brilliant work of Troy Paiva, photographer and ‘big-city spelunker’, was brought to my attention recently. This is most definitely Ballardian, in the dictionary sense, even though Troy tells me he only read Ballard recently. These irradiated visions of a crumbling, post-industrial America — decommissioned military bases; aircraft ‘boneyards’ — are all shot at night, using available light (sodium lighting, for example, plentiful in the urban archaeological ruins Troy uncovers), or the unearthly effects of red, green and blue gelled strobe flashes. The work is presented straight out of the camera, untouched by heavy Photoshopping or other post-processing techniques.
I’m hoping to soon find out some more from Troy about his work, and I’ll post the results here.
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Can anyone tell me where this place is? my friends told me about it and it sounds cool to go to.
Be warned, brave young sapling. These are [not] nice places to visit - unless you enjoy breathing asbestos fibers whilst hiding from hatchet wielding satanist cults on bad crack suppositories.* Ask Troy - he’s had some pretty close calls in the past, and must have balls like cannon shot, just hanging out long enough to capture such incredible images from our collective cultural failings.
*The hatchets are rusty and are covered with dried blood with hairs stuck to them
These stark, neon frozen non-locations represent the forever wandering hungry midnight soul of Maximum (Astral) Amerika. Of course, the mighty BALLARD saw all this coming decades ago. Enter the domain of the dead at your own risk. I’ll meat you there..
you better listen to the man. he sounds just unhinged enough to be right.
My only worry is that I’m not unhinged enough in my designer recreational psychopathology.
Hey Mr. Sellars you seen “Ghosts Of The Civil Dead”? Something about Troy’s work reminds me of that harrowing film..
“Given that external reality is a fiction, the writer’s role is almost superfluous. He does not need to invent the fiction because it is already there.” - The Mighty Ballard
I have seen the film and it is one of the best ever. The director, John Hillcoat, will be directing Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road”.
Would you be interested in interviewing Troy about Ballardian themes in his photography for ballardian.com? You seem familiar with his work, as well as Ballard’s, so it seems like a good fit. I was going to do the interview myself but don’t really have the time at the moment. You could conduct it via email, I imagine.
OK. Give me a couple of hours and I’ll rustle up something.
how did you go?
Very well. Chuck us your email and I can send you our final draft when we’re done.