When my grandfather died, I was unable to go to his funeral because I had to stay back in my hometown; my brother had been just diagnosed with bipolar disorder and things around the house were, to put it simple: havoc (denial, pills, fear, tears, books, doctors and studies where all part of the family daily routine). For my mother to travel to the city where grandpa (her father) was going to be buried in, she needed the ease of knowing that I was back home taking care of our family.
I was OK with it, I had to be, I guess. However the thing that really got to me (and that until this day, more than three years later, I can’t recover from) was that I was unable to visit for one last time my grandparents’ home. They had a lovely huge house; clean cut architectural designs with ultra funky furniture (the sixties at their best), that house even had a small Japanese garden (something that in Mexico is not common at all). I loved that place, if I ever get to build a house of my own, I will sure base it on my memories of it.
At the end of his years, grandpa had turned into something of a hoarder. Mom told me, when she got back, that they had found all kinds of little treasures and knick-knacks in his house; between mom, three uncles, my aunt, and four cousins it took them about 5 days to clean the place up. The house was so big that, until he died, nobody had noticed that grandpa bought all kinds of silly things… and on bulk! Mom still recounts about the bag full of unused pairs of socks (There were about 50! Who needs 50 pairs of socks!? She screams in laughter) and about the collections of perfumes, wristwatches, bags of sugar and dirty Kleenex.
I wanted to go, take pictures of the house; Mom doesn’t get it, she thinks it is some ill morbid thought, that I would have been disgusted with the state of the house, that I was better off never seeing the place again. Of course, it would have hurt, a lot, but it would have been the greatest gift (at least for me) to capture the spirit of the home one last time, to capture all that grandpa left behind.
I am sure Rob Dobi, could understand my wishes; as I was browsing his pictures I could not stop thinking about that house; how does it look now? Could I still go, sneak in, and steal some quiet moments?
There is something really special about his picture of abandoned buildings, they all tell really strong stories and they speak as much of who we are, as the lovely images on Architecture and Design magazines. He has quite an eye for finding magnificence were other might only see garbage and old paint. It is good that there are people like Rob Dobi taking chances in photography with unconventional places, bringing the sad and neglected parts of our world back to the light (giving them a little extra time to shine).
Have a look:
I was OK with it, I had to be, I guess. However the thing that really got to me (and that until this day, more than three years later, I can’t recover from) was that I was unable to visit for one last time my grandparents’ home. They had a lovely huge house; clean cut architectural designs with ultra funky furniture (the sixties at their best), that house even had a small Japanese garden (something that in Mexico is not common at all). I loved that place, if I ever get to build a house of my own, I will sure base it on my memories of it.
At the end of his years, grandpa had turned into something of a hoarder. Mom told me, when she got back, that they had found all kinds of little treasures and knick-knacks in his house; between mom, three uncles, my aunt, and four cousins it took them about 5 days to clean the place up. The house was so big that, until he died, nobody had noticed that grandpa bought all kinds of silly things… and on bulk! Mom still recounts about the bag full of unused pairs of socks (There were about 50! Who needs 50 pairs of socks!? She screams in laughter) and about the collections of perfumes, wristwatches, bags of sugar and dirty Kleenex.
I wanted to go, take pictures of the house; Mom doesn’t get it, she thinks it is some ill morbid thought, that I would have been disgusted with the state of the house, that I was better off never seeing the place again. Of course, it would have hurt, a lot, but it would have been the greatest gift (at least for me) to capture the spirit of the home one last time, to capture all that grandpa left behind.
I am sure Rob Dobi, could understand my wishes; as I was browsing his pictures I could not stop thinking about that house; how does it look now? Could I still go, sneak in, and steal some quiet moments?
There is something really special about his picture of abandoned buildings, they all tell really strong stories and they speak as much of who we are, as the lovely images on Architecture and Design magazines. He has quite an eye for finding magnificence were other might only see garbage and old paint. It is good that there are people like Rob Dobi taking chances in photography with unconventional places, bringing the sad and neglected parts of our world back to the light (giving them a little extra time to shine).
Have a look:
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Rob Dobi is a illustrator, t-shit designer and photographer from the United States (of course, I only posted about his work as photographer, but all the things he does are great), for more of his work you can visit his official web site (here), to look at and/or buy some of his photos you can go to his web page (here) or his Flickr Photostream (here)
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