From the ashes, Art is born

As our friends and family try to gather up their lives after the onslaught of water from hurricane Sandy that has slammed the east coast of the United States, I find it interesting that even in the middle of such a disaster there is always a bit of art that can be found. The thought actually came to me originally when I mentioned on Facebook that I wasn't sure what to do for an upcoming show and a friend of mine made the suggestion of perhaps doing pieces about natural disasters and have some of the amount of the sales to go to an organization that helps with people rebuilding their lives after such things. It really never clicked in my head until within a few minutes, a page that I'm subscribed to called My Modern Metropolis (which shares photos of contemporary and modern art pieces/ installations located in cities around the world) posted a link to their current blog post http://www.mymodernmet.com/profiles/blogs/unbelievable-photos-hurricane-sandy showing a handful of photos of the storm's aftermath. Looking through the photos, there was a part of me that felt sorry for the people who have dealt with the flood but at the same time was marveling at the eerie beauty of the images displaying on my screen.

After studying the photos, I found myself looking up other images on deviantART and came across some amazingly images that were born from capturing events that pulls on nearly every emotion but at the same time mesmerizes the viewer. I found myself wanting to share just a couple of these strangely stunning pieces of photojournalism with my readers.

StamatisGR.deviantart.com (Greece)

Stamatis has such a piece that he captured back in 2009 of a fire in Athens, Greece that started at a dairy industry building. As he states in the description of the photo:

"Fire in Athens" by StamatisGR

“An industry that produces dairy products in the center of Athens is on fire since this morning.
No casualties have been announced yet. 
19 fire engines and 60 fire men are trying to put it out.
The 200 workers of the industry are all safe.
All traffic in the surrounding area has been blocked.
Publishedin "Daily Telegraph" Britain's best selling quality newspaper on their 15th of September issue with 900.000 circulation per day! “

"St. John's Church Earthquake" by Niv24

Niv24.deviantart.com (New Zealand)

Photographer Ben Niven has his own piece which shows the Church of St. John located in Christchurch, New Zealand and how the building looked after an earthquake that New Zealand suffered in 2010. The fact that he went and has it as a black and white piece just adds to the dramatic impact.

You can actually check out the church's website http://www.stjohnschch.org/ and check out their photos on the amount of damage that the building sustained and the progress of their reconstruction efforts to rebuild the church. 

"Station Fire, Tujunga, California" by Szenz

Szenz.deviantart.com (California)

Hobby photographer Zenz was one of many who were keeping an eye on the Station Fire that went through Tujunga, California back in 2009 and was able to capture a deadly beautiful shot . Looking at the fire rolling over the hills of Southern California as it inches closer to the city below make the view hold their breath but at the same time the balance of darkness and spots of oranges and reds really captures attention.

Now that I'm looking at these photos in another light, does it make me a bad person? I don't think so. The anticipation and uneasiness that I feel while looking at them wondering how the people in the area are doing is there but at the same time I appreciate the skill and the insight the photographers put into each shot they captured. I think that I'll leave any further thoughts up to my readers to share.