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In
April, 2013 I began photographing a 213-acre piece of undeveloped
land in Marple, Pennsylvania that at the time was owned by the
Archdiocese of Philadelphia. The land sits beside a Catholic high
school, and also had within it two social service facilities. It was
originally intended to be part of an existing cemetery, St.
Peter and St. Paul, that lies across a road. I was
familiar with this place because it was along a route I would take to
drive one of my daughters to dance class. During the fall and winter,
when the vines hung over broken branches and fallen leafless trees, my
daughter and I would joke about how scary it looked.
When I began to take pictures I was only interested in this forbidding
aspect of its appearance, and I photographed it from the side of the
road. However after several visits I curious to see what was inside. I
spent one painful afternoon unsuccessfully trying to fight through
dense vines and and pricker-filled underbrush in order to get in deeper,
before I came across a well-worn path leading in. Once inside I found
the whole place was marked with trails, criss-crossed by hills and
streams, and graced with small clearings, meadows and bogs. I have
returned often and in different seasons, but in all my many visits I
have only once come across another person - a boy walking his dog.
Otherwise I have always wandered alone.
As I explored I soon saw it was mostly place for kids, evidenced by the
litter, graffiti, signs of gathering places and play areas - all of
their own making. It reminded me of my own youth, and having the
wonderful salvation to find an untouched, undiscovered place to make
your own. But I was also struck by the nature of some of the messages
the kids had left on the trees that seemed to allude to some
undiscribed emotional pain.
About a year after I first entered these woods I read a headline that the
archdiocese was selling most of the land to a developer in order to
raise needed funds. The land will likely soon be turned into a vast mix of
stores and housing - erasing most of what is now there. I hope to
continue photographing as the landscape changes.
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