Urban Portraits 2014 – 2021

“Cities bring together culture and ideas, convert human power in to form, energy in to civilization, they are like brains directing and developing civilized life”, – Joel Kotkin. The organism of the city is that of a distinct entity that has been shaped by social, political, economic and topographic factors. Many cities have endured periods of calamity and trauma that have significantly altered or even ended their existence. A myriad of causes have been responsible, including war, famine, pestilence, flood, fire, earthquakes and volcanoes. Often structures of monumentality, of seeming permanence and stability, there is an underlying fragility and transience that threatens the life of the urban entity. The city represents a fragile compact between the forces of nature and those of human desire and inequality.