City pinhole.

I've been using pinhole cameras for a number of years to photograph a variety of settings. This current group of images focuses on the urban context. My original intent was to focus only on the elements that are "native" to the urban context: buildings, streets, cars, people. However, as I have continued with the project. I have noticed the focus gradually shifting toward the occasional intersection of natural and urban elements.

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Pinhole cameras, of course, have some very specific limitations and possibilities which are not a function of using more conventional cameras: the tiny aperture (approximately f200) allows for essentially limitless depth of field while simultaneously forcing lengthy exposures even in the brightest light (four seconds to several minutes). To take advantage of this unlimited depth of field, I have placed my camera at ground level, which enlarges the elements close to the camera while making distant objects shrink in scale. Consequently, our typical sense of order and significance is reversed. Small, discarded objects suddenly become larger and more important, while huge buildings in the background begin to look like dollhouses.

In addition to this reversal, a new, previously unnoticed world begins to emerge. The larger, "normal" world remains visible with its buildings, cars and sidewalks but has become strangely silent, remote and inactive. We might imagine a small creature wandering through this collection of weeds, pebbles and dirt with little awareness or concern for the distant world of humans. Adding to the strangeness are the peculiar patches of natural growth springing from the cracks of this asphalt-covered world. One has the sense we are witnessing the beginning of a steady reclaiming of the urban environment by the natural elements which the city was designed to control--if not destroy.

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MICHAEL MCCARTHY was born in Ithaca. NY He was educated at the University of Vermont (BA in History), and the Tyler School of Art (MFA in Photography). He currently teaches photography and digital imaging at the Santa Reparta International School of Art in Florence, Italy.