Abandoned Building, Shoreditch 2007
A to B
Walked by this place towards an office for four months, and on my last day I thought “Fuck it, take the shot”.
I’m on Great Eastern Street, before the Holywell Lane turn-off, and every stone rests somewhere between decadence and decay. Up the road an enormous Billie Piper is draped over a grotty facade. The building’s curves distort Billie’s own so her trim belly manages to dwarf her breasts and hips, while her eyes and smile get truncated and contorted. The whole thing, as a sexually alluring advert, just fails, fundamentally so. Surely Shoreditch scenesters aren’t the target for this? But is such expense really just for lorry drivers skirting the C-charge?
The area exists in a strange balance: Trendy, but useless. Historically fires have kept this end of the city in check, but nowadays people themselves burn out much faster. The walls seem to eat themselves as minds shit out slogans to conquer other phrases, each alongside the next dominant image, the next victorious trend. I can’t hate these people because they’re doing what they’ve always dreamed: each a miniature rock star, just without the responsibility to music.
‘Vapid’ and ‘Venomous’ are too easy and inaccurate. Here tongues chatter and whisper words of competition and fulfillment. Here, these people actually care about what they’re doing, and do so all the more because it means so little to anyone else. They’re building a reality of their own design, ignoring London as it falls apart around them, and as I type I realise I’m probably just doing the same, only with pixels and Polaroids.
© Matthew Sheret, 2008
The Polaroid Press 