Borrow Build Abandon by Jamie McGregor Smith

This documentary series by Somerset born photographer Jamie McGregor Smith explores the legacy of the 2004 Athens Olympics. They seem to suggest a modern ruin, similar to the Ancient Greek ruins of the Acropolis and Delphi, that has come about from the the country's current economic downturn. Only three of the twenty-four stadiums, built at a cost of $15 Billion, are currently in public use, the remaining requiring an annual $100 million in upkeep costs. McGregor Smith says, "Olympic construction highlights the continued trend of public borrowing for structures that have limited shelf life. They come at a huge cost of limited natural resources, requiring energy consumption and carbon emission that far defies the intelligence and understanding we've been fortunate to develop.. We need to consider the possibility that all human construction in future could have the technology of functional adaptation". Watch this space London. 

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Spray Painted Concrete Bollards by EVOL

Back in the beginning of the month I wrote a post on the urban cityscapes spray painted on cardboard by graffiti artist EVOL (see it here). The pictures in this post however, show another piece of work; the spray painted concrete bollards made to look like rundown housing estates, situated in Smithfield Market. 

Images: My own

Patrick Baillet

French artist and design teacher Patrick Baillet creates these juxtapositions of classical painted figures layered over graffiti in decayed and abandoned buildings. Titled "Last Palimpsest", his work reappropriates successive spaces, placing a symbolic battle between culture and instincts. In his own words, the photographs present "nostalgic wanderings and urban brutality". His paintings create an element of beauty in a brutal and uncared-for environment with the thoughtful and haunting figures occupying the spaces, which no-one else is interested in.

Images: Bloody Loud