The built world
What was there. What happened. What came afterward.
Independent records in date order. A lithograph stays a lithograph. A photograph stays a photograph. A fire, an earthquake, a demolition, a steel frame — each is dated from documents, not inferred from style.
Where a later camera record is missing, the hole is on the page. The Living Realm does not fill it.
01 · Chicago
Chicago, 1871
A lithograph of the city drawn as it was before 8–10 October 1871, a photograph of the burnt district, then a camera on rebuilt State Street in 1893. Three kinds of record. The fire is dated from documents.
Great Chicago Fire, 8–10 October 1871. Fire of 8–10 October 1871. Davis’s Harper’s wood engraving and Flint’s 1872 lithograph show the city as drawn before. Barnard’s plate is the camera on the burnt district. State Street 1893 is the rebuilt commercial street.
Before
1872
Drawn as it was before the fire
Event
1871
Photograph of the burnt district
After
1893
Rebuilt State Street
02 · San Francisco
San Francisco, 1906
An 1878 bird’s-eye lithograph of the city from the bay, then George Lawrence’s kite photograph of the ruins six weeks after 18 April 1906. The rebuilt city as a later camera record is not here yet.
San Francisco earthquake and fire, 18 April 1906. Earthquake 18 April 1906, followed by fires. Lawrence’s plate is dated 28 May 1906 — aftermath, from the air. The 1878 Currier lithograph is a drawing from twenty-eight years earlier. Do not treat them as the same kind of evidence.
Before
1878
Bird’s-eye lithograph from the bay
Event
1906
Aerial photograph of the ruins
After
after
Rebuilding
Gap recorded
03 · New York
New York — masonry to steel frame
An 1873 harbor lithograph, then cameras on steel-frame construction: Flatiron 1902, Woolworth ironwork 1912, the finished tower, the city seen from it. Singer Tower, photographed standing, was demolished in 1967–68 — that demolition is a separate documented event.
Before
1873
Harbor lithograph
Transition
1902
Flatiron, completed, from the street
Transition
1912
Woolworth frame going up
After
c. 1913
Woolworth completed
After
c. 1913
The city from the new tower
04 · Paris
Paris — Avenue de l’Opéra
Marville recorded the cut. A later camera recorded the new avenue looking toward Palais Garnier. A photograph of the streets that stood there before the cut is not in this archive. The hole stays.
Cutting of Avenue de l’Opéra, c. 1853–77. Haussmann’s cut for the avenue that opens on Palais Garnier. Marville’s plate is the demolition. The later street photograph is the avenue in use. Do not treat them as the same moment.
Before
before
The streets that were cut
Gap recorded
Event
c. 1877
Photograph of the demolition
After
c. 1878
The new avenue, toward the opera