There’s something eerie about walking through an abandoned building, particularly one with furniture, posters, and other paraphernalia showing that it was once well lived in.
Photographers Rusty Tagliareni and Christina Mathews of Weird NJ know all about it. They’ve traveled to abandoned buildings throughout the state for work on the upcoming issue of the magazine “Weird NJ” and for Tagliareni’s new photo book “Forsaken: Abandoned in and around New Jersey” published by Weird NJ ($10).
Tagliareni and Mathews, as well as “Weird NJ” editor Mark Moran and designer Mark Sceurman, will be at Maxwell’s, 1039 Washington St., on Monday, May 16 to kick off a related photo exhibit.
The event will be held at 7 p.m., and is free and open to the public.
The photographic exhibition will hang in Maxwell’s through the month of June.
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Tagliareni said that he’s had an interest in abandoned places since his “high school days in the darkroom.”
“My first outings to abandoned locations were ones of pure aesthetic reasons,” Tagliareni said in a release. “I found that there were things in these places that I saw nowhere else. The way light creeps and slithers into dark corners, the abstract patterns found in the flakes of peeling paint, and the surreal imagery of nature once again reclaiming a place it had lost long ago. My hope is that through my work will come a better respect for these places for those who document them.”
The book chronicles abandoned prisons, play areas, summer camps, high schools, and even military bases that have been abandoned throughout New Jersey, the most densely populated state in the nation.
In addition, both the book and the recent issue of the magazine tell the sad story of a Pennsylvania mental hospital that was closed after abuses of patients came to light.
Abandoned spaces in Hudson County are usually gobbled up by entrepreneurs or development companies, so none of the photos in the book feature properties in the immediate surrounding area. Many of the places profiled in the book are in western or southern New Jersey.
Photos of a Sussex County summer camp still show the signs of children, including names and various years scribbled on the walls, and bed frames.
The book also includes an estate and vacation destination that was at its peak in 1972 and once housed 150,000 guests.
Also featured in the book is the Sandy Hook military base. The Hook, as its referred to in the book, hosted a Cold War era Nike Missile base, and was “one of the primary locations that would have been the launch of the United States’ nuclear arsenal in the event of a total war. Today this facility seems unspectacular, its giant metal doors sealed shut from time and corrosion.”
The book showcases some of the creepiest places in New Jersey, but gives the reader a chance to travel through them without the scary feelings of actually visiting the sites.
The photographic exhibition will hang in Maxwell’s through the month of June. For more information, check out WeirdNJ.com.
Ray Smith may be reached at RSmith@hudsonreporter.com