(Full moon night. 240 seconds. f/10. ISO 200)
Earlier this year, I took a night photography workshop in Arizona taught by Mike Hows and Joe Reed. It was a really great time hanging out in this airplane boneyard catching up with old friends. If you’re looking to do a night photography workshop I’d strongly encourage you to check out one of theirs. They get access to rad locations and have a great laid back and “hands on” teaching style.
Demolition on Greystone Park Psychiatric Hospital has been underway for a few months now and yesterday, video was posted showing the demolition has reached the Administration section of the Kirkbride, which means this corridor is gone.
In a few months, she will be nothing more than a memory and that is very tragic. History is vanishing right before our eyes and once it is gone, it will be too late to ever get it back…
These seclusion rooms are located on the first floor, basement level, of the Polk Building, or K Building, at the Western State Hospital in Tennessee. These rooms contained two doors, the first has an open window with a metal covering. The second is a solid wood door with a glass window. This allowed nurses to check on patients but kept the noise to a minimum.
This stairwell in the Wingdale Wards at Harlem Valley State Hospital, like many asylum stairwells, has a metal fence to protect patients from intentional injuries by throwing themselves over the railing to the floor below.
First light seeps through a small personnel door in the side of the cooling tower.
Having the opportunity to revisit this location was really awesome. The last time I was here, it was incredibly humid and the temps reached the high 80's. I felt much more refreshed during this last visit and was able to capture some of the angles and perspectives I didn't photograph on the first visit.
Never stop exploring...
Night. 90 second exposure.
James Withers Sloss was one of the founders of the city of Birmingham, Alabama. In 1880, he founded the Sloss Furnace Company, where he constructed the city's first blast furnace and contributed to the industrial production of iron in the south. In 1899, when James Sloss sold the company to investors, they rebuilt the furnaces with modern equipment and also constructed brand new boilers .
The site operated until 1969 and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in the 1980's. The Sloss Furnaces now operate as a museum and are open to the public.
http://slossfurnaces.com/
This was the last location we visited on our trip to the South. Finding medical equipment is always a nice treat, because many of the locations have been stripped of all furniture and artifacts.
I think it's about time I hit the road for another adventure documenting history...
(Dark interior. 60 second exposure lit with primarily LED panels.)
Many feet below the surface staring at the blast lock doors inside a Titan I Intercontinental Ballistic Missile site in California.
Sunset sneaks into a airplane cockpit at a private aircraft boneyard in Arizona.
Taken during a 2-night photography workshop taught by Mike Hows and Joe Reed.
Corridor inside the Wingdale Ward at the former Harlem Valley State Hospital in New York.
Taken during blue hour on a full moon evening.
This is another one of my favorite Kirkbride buildings at the Hudson River Psychiatric Hospital in New York.
Much of the building has decayed over the years since closing in 2003. Poughkeepsie, New York experiences snow, heat and humidity throughout the year, which have all contributed to the demise of the wings of this hospital. Fortunately, the Administration section, shown here, has remained in tact due to a layer of protection placed over the roof before the weather took a toll.
Sadly, the beautiful Kirkbride building at the Greystone Park Psychiatric Hospital is at the end of her life. Demolition is looming in the very near future for this architectural beauty.
In honor of this glorious structure, I have added a new photo gallery on my website: http://amyheiden.com/greystone-park-psychiatric/
I visited Virginia City, Nevada for the first time earlier this year and found myself a few hundred steps from the hotel, photographing this mine beneath the moonlight on our second night there. It was magical.
