The Niagara Frontier

Lying in the shadow of the Niagara region is a New York landscape left frozen and forgotten in time. Once revered in the late 1800s as a leader in industrial inovation and a retreat for the wealthy, the City of Buffalo and its surrounding towns, with lovingly-planned architectural innovation and civil functionality, has been left to the lower middle class, the retired, and the working poor. Though initially fueled by industry and prosperity, with innovations that were the envy of world, the spirit of the city was broken over multiple periods of decline. It is only recently that the city and the state have begun working together to revive the skeleton of this once-great city. The result is an architectural landscape that is beautiful, tragic, and sometimes hopeful.

This series of photographs witnesses the desolation of the American middle class as it watches power and prosperity slip through its fingers. Layers of history are juxtaposed in the monumental and the quotidian: a steel-and-glass skyscraper shooting up behind a historical building from the late nineteenth century. These large format black and white cityscapes combine the traditions of the Dusseldorf School of Photography with elements of social documentary By focusing on sites and buildings that are within view of major roadways, but framed from unexpected, topographic angles, the images balance nostalgia for Buffalo's Gilded-Age past with a sense of discovery that emerges from seeing the familiar anew. The photographs negotiate the stark differences in scale between the landmarks of a city and its inhabitants-minimizing, but never ignoring the human figure, and its importance to the city's growth and renewal.