As a photographic
artist whose subject is architecture, I've been under tremendous pressure
from the architecture/preservation community, the architectural periodicals
and my collector base to produce imagery of the WTC.
I have however, ignored the pressure to photograph the ruins. The WTC was conceived as a symbol of power and prosperity; a business center designed as a city onto itself. The towers only existed, were only built that tall, were only as impressive as they were because of the businesses and people that filled them. Everyone forgets that architecture is about fuctionality--it only exists if there are people to fill it; it only looks the way it does because of what it's function is. When I photograph architecture, I believe that I'm photographing a living thing: a building breathes, gets sick, needs repair evolves, ages and sometimes dies---but it's lifesouce, its blood is its occupants streaming in and out which keep it alive. Since September 11th the 110-floor towers are less about a grandiose architectural structure than the thousands who were its lifesource.
Knowing that I was only receiving requests for WTC imagery because the buildings were violently destroyed, then turning a profit made me sick. But as the fifth request came in, I realized that this was my opportunity to make the sizable contribution which I dreamed of making to one of the FDNY relief funds.
I'm extremely proud of this body of work---it's spiritual, reverent and especially WTC #2, exhibits my idea of the living building: the structures on either side stand stolid almost without hint of life inside, but the WTC is pulsing with energy. For me, the WTC has always possessed a spirituality: they were the buildings in the NYC skyline that reached highest into the clouds. I hope that this folio helps you see the human element of architecture--not only the mind that conceived of the structure or the muscle that constructed it but its lifesourse which will be missed most of all.
All proceeds from sales of the WTC folio will be donated to the families of the fallen firefighters. This folio was created in honor of those members of the FDNY who ran into the burning towers while everyone else was running out.
Madeleine Doering
Isom
October, 2001
To view images of the World Trade Center, Click on the numbers below.
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