architectural purgatory
I have a folder on my desktop called “random” and it is my haven for pictures likes these. Random buildings from random towns. This one was a bit different. After a Red Sox assignment in Ft. Myers, Fla., I was taking the usual long way home to explore and found a decaying city block of little shops and what looked liked a theater. I spent some time in awe of the structure. It had obviously been empty for a long time, with little care. Walking around the debris and junk disposed of on site, each wall and each doorway reveled a little twist of character that I love so much to find in my sprawlscapes.
I made plenty of frames and found a notice of a public hearing to demolish the building. After reading up on the history of the building on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., I come to find out that McCollum Hall and the neighboring businesses were built back in 1938 and were the stomping grounds for black jazz musicians by the likes of B.B. King, Duke Ellington, and Louis Armstrong in the height of segregation where blacks and whites came to listen and dance. That, my friends, is why I find these places so interesting. Sometimes a wall is just a wall, but more often than not is is the only thing standing between me and the history of our community. The city has plans to renovate and restore the site after purchasing it at half of the appraised value.
A small part of me really wishes that there was a way to just freeze the decay of these structures and to keep them in their current state. When cities and agencies come in to “renovate,” more often than not, there are way too many modifications and requirements to keep it to current building standards. A part of the history of the place is lost in the new transformation. Granted, I can appreciate the fact that they will be able to be used for years to come for new generations, but what is lost in the cleaning-up of a place can’t be replaced.
I know that keeping a molding, crumbling building as is really isn’t possible, so that’s whay I photograph these places in their current state – sort of an architectural purgatory.
