Michael Gatch

Profile

Age: 22
City: Valparaiso
Country: United States

Joined: Nov 2007

I sometimes think of myself as a photographic preservationist. A freelance historian. The history and stories I dig up about the buildings I seek out are often much more American than we would care to admit. Entire structures filled with tons of equipment just to prove we could do something, and then left to decay.

Industry, and the ability to manufacture almost anything. This is what defined America for over one hundred years. We continue to export our industry and effectively tear out the backbone of our productivity. Our industry won us wars, it kept us competitive for so many years, and now we are losing all physical reminders of this fact.

Schools will continue teaching the history of our industry, but to really even begin to understand it, you have to see it. The scale, the simplicity and complexity that all came together to create this industrial machine.

My aim is to preserve some semblance of this history through photography. To preserve, as best I can, A crumbling chapter out of history that I find to be very important.

“That which exists through itself is called The Eternal. The Eternal has neither name nor shape. It is the one essence, the one primal spirit. Essence and life cannot be seen. They are contained in the light of heaven. The light of heaven cannot be seen. It is contained in the two eyes.”
Bertrand Russell

Equipment:
Pentax K20D
Pentax K10D
quirky lousy tripods.
Sigma 17-70 (currently in use exclusively due to me being lazy)
Several old M-42 Super Takumar lenses.
Several Pentax M series lenses.

My favorite and most popular shots.

Through The Past.