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Bankrupt

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Bankrupt

At the beginning of 2001, immediately after the internet bubble had burst, I began taking pictures of recently abandoned offices, and the things people had left behind.

It wasn’t a photography project, rather it was economic archeology. There was something strange about walking into a recently abandoned office. The heavy, Pompeii-like stillness, punctuated by the occasional sound of the air-conditioning, turning itself on. A coat-hanger waiting patiently for a coat. A drawer stuffed with take-out menus. Everywhere, signs of life, interrupted.

America had not suffered such a vertiginous economic collapse since the 1930’s, and I wanted to document the human cost, while it was happening.  I clearly remember thinking at the time that I’d never see something like this again in my lifetime. Of course, I was very wrong. But the results are the same. The human cost is the same.

This was published as a book by Twin Palms press in 2005

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