East St. Louis, Illinois Death Trap Collective Series

The East St. Louis Death Trap Collective Series

Building upon the theme “What inspires me is the lack of inspiration that surrounds me,” its basis is focused on the confrontation I face amongst my environment includes fears and the instability of destruction. To me, this does not only occur personally, but also economically, socially and culturally. The multiple elements portrayed in these series of images hover over this urban society as a destination of ruin to look forward to. With this idea in mind, I am incorporating the presence of a personal narrative that has me face the subjects and envision the consequences into a sequential pattern of cause-and-effect.

            Within the presentation for each image they express the stage of present devastation. The subject is set at the bottom of the composition to signify the social, cultural, and economic degradation. The sky is open as a conceptual message to serve the idea of “rising above” the deteriorating components of my environment. Instead of horizontal framing, the vertical presentation is the conceptual component to convey elevation above my surroundings.

Collectively, this entire series is  build of four different series’. The four different groups are The Liquor Store Series, The Night Club Series, Dilapidated Economics Series and Fallen Home Series. All of these photos are relative to one another in environment, narrative and meaning. All of these places exist in the East St. Louis, IL area. Being from this area, I see how it is reflected on what is present and the issues prevalent needs to be addressed on the world wide scale, not only here but everywhere on this planet that resemble the places like this. This is the raw and this is the real.