WHAT IS A MALL WITHOUT PEOPLE?
It was 2021, and the world had just begun to function normally after enduring the pandemic. For those brave enough to venture outside and explore the locale, they’d discover that some things had changed.
Please, wear a mask.
Please, wear a mask.
Please, keep six feet apart.
Please, keep six feet apart.
To find signage without either of the above phrases was near impossible. It was as if a secret organization who’d been waging war against the doomsday virus had left behind warnings while all of us had been locked away safely for who knows how long in an air-tight vault. Outside, the world still remained and even after society was allowed to reopen, the fear of catching Covid-19 remained too.
Target Plastic Bag, 2022
For the first time since graduating I had gotten my own apartment. It was situated not too far from the Treasure Chest Casino’s parking lot on Kenner, Louisiana’s northern side. There in the body of water in which the casino floated, Lake Pontchartrain, there existed sloshing waters critical to the development of my artistry. The forever changing movement of the grayness helped me to come to terms with my chosen life path; it’d put me in a trance where I’d search for an answer to my biggest question.
Should I have moved here or had I made a mistake and should’ve gone to New Orleans?
I found myself wanting to get out there like every other photographer living in the southeast. The problem was I already signed a lease. Yeah, Kenner was only thirty minutes away, but doing that each day? Week? Month? My car would explode.
I considered my options. There had to be something close by worthy of my visual acuity. Something unique. And it hit me. I could visit The Esplanade Mall. Besides the New Orleans International Airport, it was one of the most iconic locations to visit in the city I called home.
The Esplanade Overgrowth, 2022
The Esplanade Mall wasn’t how I remembered it at all. It was empty.
My memory was telling me that vehicles should be extending from the entrance to the outskirts. How long have I been gone? It felt all too surreal to my now adult self.
I walked up familiar steps leading onto the second floor where the ground could’ve used a touch up and had my camera at the ready. The entrance doors slid apart with ease, opening to more “voids in space”.
Cold air caressed my skin and suddenly, I heard an unusual silence.
All sounds associated with shopping malls like conversations, laughter, screaming, Muzak, and childish amusement were absent. The quiet was so unbearably loud that I actually could hear the mall’s AC units and escalators. Steadily, I kept on moving to assure myself that there was life. (I mean, come on. It was a mall.) The further I went the more emptiness I saw and the more I wanted to retract that inner thought.
I TRULY WAS THE ONLY MAN.
Lonely Crane Machine, 2021
Until I happened upon fellow citizens.
There were active elderly walking laps in and around the mall’s corridors, and shoppers milling about perusing the merchandise in stores. Some of them donned masks and some didn’t.
It was so strange.
Where was the “mall”? The cacophonic sound? The rest of the people? There should’ve been more of them crowding the video game stores, clothing stores, shoe stores, sweet shops…
Without the people…well, without the people it was nothing.
There were arcade machines still waiting for players; vending machines still waiting for thirsty buyers; completely dark clothing and shoe stores still waiting for fashionistas and shoeheads...I ended up getting so lost in my exploration that I’d eventually reach the exterior where nature had laid its claim.
Thick Growth, 2022
Apparently once man phased out, black cats took it upon themselves to inhabit and roam the unkempt landscape. There were also these big birds nesting in overgrown trees all along the mall’s facade in search of dead vermin. And so many vines had grown that they had begun to sprawl out of the walls like a fungal infection.
Esplanade Cat, 2022
Tree Blues, 2022
Vine Overgrowth, 2022
I saw a security car parked to the side in a well hidden pocket too!
I began to sweat. Were they patrolling for curious explorers like me?
Security, 2022
With gusto I went even closer, and discovered a detail I had overlooked out of fear of the law. Its tires were flat. The damn thing was abandoned. Maybe the world ended.
For shopping malls at least.
The Esplanade Entrance Mat, 2021
