Photographer Shane Perez has been documenting the abandoned crevices of New York for over a decade. Born in Miami, the Bronx photographer draws his inspiration from the decaying, hulking ruins of the city and juxtaposes them with comparatively beautiful, fragile subjects -- nude women.
"Primarily the figures serve to add a narrative element to the images," Perez tells HuffPost, "giving them a bit more depth than just being derelict machines and buildings."
Nudity makes the figures vulnerable to both the elements and the environment. It forces a return to the world we inhabited before the invention of handrails and warning signs and all the other things we use to protect ourselves. Humans are fragile things and I'd like to think that my photos serve to illustrate that as well as our distance from our natural state.
Perez says that finding and shooting at such spaces can be dicey, but that neither he nor the model have ever been in dangerous situations, and often find people who discover them quite agreeable.
I recall one shoot where we inadvertently held up construction on a condo building about a block away for a good 30 minutes. We were shooting on some abandoned oil tanks and when I looked over the entire construction crew was on the roof passing around a pair of binoculars. The model waved to them and they all cheered. Eventually the boss showed up and made them go back to work.
Our 2024 Coverage Needs You
Already contributed? Log in to hide these messages.