NICK HARNETT // Quilted Cities: Detroit



Quilted Cities: Detroit
Detroit, a hard-working city, has been hand sculpted by its citizens in good times and bad. This series, an “Abstracted Documentation” of Detroit, showcases portraits of different neighborhoods, demonstrating their various perspectives, cultures, politics, and environmental and historical presence within the city.

Made in Photoshop, the process of layering the images creates artificial structures that support the life of the subjects. In every part of Detroit, a ghost figure can be seen, imprints left by the hands that built the city and tore it down. The city’s very foundations have been impacted by these deeds, and neglect leaves a deep impression. An example of this is sidewalks, some are old and not walkable with grass growing through the cracks, some are brand new, and some have hands prints and initials from the people that impacted them. There is an abstracted relation between the rich history of the city photographed and the photographic method that brings a vibrant presence of reality from the images. I hope to embrace the human instinct to bring equilibrium to something unstable, while showing different emotions and characteristics, such as anger, depression, joy, shame, solitude, and trauma. The images become a breathing entity between the layers; giving it a birth, journey, and death.

While photographing, Cubism and Surrealism were influential perspectives. By layering anywhere from six to 24 images, the completed project mimics the multiple perspectives and distortions found in the two art movements. The final product is made by taking several images in one spot while moving the camera, taking a step, and repeating the process. The layering becomes a visual representation of many people looking at the same object and seeing something different.

These images are seen by the viewer's subjective impact, imprinting the footprints at which one arrives and departs within the space that you are currently reading this at. I also - walk not thinking about the ghost figure that I leave behind.

www.nickharnett.com