Detroit | a cherished landscape

I love Detroit.

I am captivated by it; consumed by its poetry. There is no other place quite so mesmerizing, as far as the accidental art of an urban landscape goes, as Detroit.

And, to be clear, that is the real merit: "accidental."

It is not nearly so interesting to see something that was intended for your consumption, positioned in such a way so as to seem more beautiful to a passerby than it truly is - everybody loves the frosted windows; nobody considers the trash dragged out the back.

In Detroit, nothing is hidden. Everything is raw and honest. It has to be. It has no other choice but to stand, bare breasted, with stretch marks and scars outlining the lines as they really fall, drawing hashes over our airbrushed mental image. She stands, with blemishes and burns across the body; all the while with her face turned upwards into the hot, hot summer sun.

I love her for that. I am captivated by her sincerity - the simplicity and circumstantial display of everything that we are taught is ugly. While everywhere else, we see things nipped and tucked and tanned and toned and then turned, in just such a way, so as to dazzle and taunt; mislead and manipulate, here, in Detroit, we see only what it is - what is real, straightforward, "unpretty." And yet, as we look, she is also unmoving - accepting our gaze, unapologetic, as we stand there feeling very much as though we, too, are staring at the sun.

There is so much beauty in the grittiness of things - so much more aesthetic depth and richness to a landscape that evolves exactly as it was meant to, without pretending that it didn't. Here: the textures of broken glass and falling brick; the cacophony of a city's fabric tearing apart at the seams; dozens of textiles, strewn about in the streets or stood up along their edges.

One scarcely has to point and click, and the photo turns out beautiful.
I said that about Santorini, too.
I mean it more with Detroit.

Aesthetically speaking, never before have I seen such an interesting subject in a city. Where every other city's photos have been captured a million times, every story a regurgitation of another, here I feel that the images go on forever - I could stay for weeks and still discover more; turn a corner, widen my focus or narrow it, and see something new or different. I feel as though it is a fresh story - one just now being written and (unlike horrific Vegas) one that will not - cannot - be scripted, but must rather be written organically.

Perhaps I'm glamorizing - romanticizing.
Or, perhaps not.

From a study of The City as a reflection and manifestation of her people, Detroit is my favorite.
And I want, somehow, to be one of them.