“Rivets and Rust” — Detail of weathered and distressed steel structure on the Steel Bridge, Portland, Oregon
I made this photograph at about the same time as another one that I posted recently — it also featured a close-up view of the weathered structure of an old steel bridge with rivets, colorful stains, and lots of weathering.
Whether the specific location is all that important is debatable, but I made the photograph on the “Steel Bridge” (that’s actually its name), over the Willamette River in Portland, Oregon. This is an old and quite busy structure, and it is full of fascinating little vignettes.
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“Detail, Steel Bridge ” — Structural detail of the Steel Bridge, Portland, Oregon
This might be the most unimaginatively named steel bridge in the United States — as far as I can tell it is actually called “Steel Bridge.” Which it is. The bridge crosses the Willamette River in Portland, Oregon, where its double-deck structure (with a center section that can be raised) carries trains, cars, pedestrians, bicycles, and rapid transit across the water. When we visited we joined the pedestrians, which gave me a chance to look at the structure close up.
Old distressed and weathered structures like this intrigue me, and I know I’m not the only photographer who has this interest. Sometimes I imagine the contrast between some engineer crafting very careful and precise design drawings of the structure and its smaller elements, producing materials that reflect the conceptual perfection of such structures… and the real-world reality the creeps in over the long life of such structures. The latter is visible here in the multiple layers of paint, now marked by stain patterns and split open to reveal rust.
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“Mondrian Wall” — A wall of a school building closed during the pandemic.
Why, yes, this is from the “Postcards from Pandemia” series of photographs made on my almost-daily walks in the greater neighborhood, an area including a range of subjects in suburban neighborhoods, apartment complexes, closed schools, nearly empty parks, a largely shuttered business district, and light industrial zones.
This is a detail of a wall at the front of a school that is became deserted at about the time when students would have been pushing through the last part of the academic year and looking forward to summer. If you are like me, you might find more than one way to look at this scene.
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This little section of canyon wall is one that I’ve marveled (marbled?) at for years, stopping there every time I visit this canyon and pondering how to photograph it. Although I find the patterns (and what they imply about the geology of this place) to be remarkable, it isn’t each to find a way to photograph them the way I want. On this visit the canyon was quite dark and the light filtering down from above was soft and blue-toned.
I am about as far from being a trained geologist as one can be. I have never taken a single course in the subject, though I have read a bit. Nonetheless, I always marvel at the record of time and geological forces that created a little spot like this. Some material was, I presume, laid down “here” over a long period of time. Additional time allowed for it to transform into rock. As geological forces on various scales did their work, cracks appeared that permitted the entrance of entirely different material to create what we see as veins — but which are perhaps better thought of as layers. Eventually the force of water (and perhaps a weakness in the structure of the rock?) exposed this rock to the light. And then I arrived to photograph it…
G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.
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