Look Again 1

All Images: Northwest Leicester, August 2020

Part of the appeal of living in any city, of average size or above, is its ability to keep throwing up new instances of Psychogeographic resonance, even if one has dwelt amongst its streets and buildings for an extended period.  Sometimes this is to do with any dynamic city's tendency towards regeneration or expansion (as epitomised by my numerous construction-related photos of recent months)  The converse of that is, of course the numerous examples of picturesque decay or entropy to be found in many urban environments - particularly where economic decline, faltering investment (or global pandemic) have held sway.  Clearly, I'm no stranger to those either.  Often, it is the state of uneasy tension between those two tendencies - and the surprising juxtapositions it can generate, that supply the real thrills of urban observation.

But there's another, primarily subjective, category of psycho-geo surprise to be relished during routine urban drifts.  It has to do with the re-framing of the familiar or overlooked, and with the ability of a particular landmark or locality that one may have largely ignored, to suddenly reveal itself in anew.  Such (re)discoveries can signify the breaking of old assumptions, and presage the forging of new narratives or conceptual connections.  My last post dealt with the idea of an entirely new edifice suddenly emerging before my lens - as if having hidden in plain sight for weeks, or even months.  The building featured here also stands as an example of something stumbled across, as the result of a slight deviation in an habitual route.  However, what makes it worthy of comment here is the fact that it was here all along - suddenly appearing to take on a new significance, on a particular day, and in particular conditions, for reasons one can only seek to analyse after the event.

Cobden House, should be pretty hard to ignore.  Despite being situated amongst the workaday environs of Leicester's Cobden Street Industrial Estate, it rises impressively above its generally low-level surroundings, and is clearly visible from the busy link road which passes nearby.  It's also typical of the style of degraded post-war commercial Modernism that surely should surely appeal to my tastes on any day of the week.  Exhibiting defiantly monotonous window grids, and long, parallel balconies, the building combines Brutal aesthetics, with an aura of relative dilapidation.  The latter impression is somewhat deceptive - being something that often adheres to such buildings, even when reasonably well maintained (as here).  The now-standard narrative is, of course, one of a long-despised and supposedly 'failed' architectural style, lingering on as a dilapidated monument to a society (and associated economic orthodoxy), whose priorities changed decades ago.  Could many of its exemplars'  inability to age elegantly be a causal factor in this, or merely a result of it - I wonder?  Either way, Cobden House clearly still functions, but now as an expedient shelter for multiple scuffling manufacturing or distribution businesses (in which the city specialises) - but lacking any real sense of unified purpose or real vision.

But, of course, it's the external staircase tower, appended to one end of what would otherwise be a pretty featureless block, that gives the building its real presence(or even, drama).  It's a stylistic flourish not untypical of its era, and suggest that the architect of what must have always been envisaged as a largely functional edifice, was given scope to dream just a little.  It's urgent, ascending diagonals, and mildly futuristic capital speak of a faith in a technological future, and even the implied utopian impulse to create a better, more dynamic society, that now feel like pretty distant memories.  That seductive narrative of the failed utopia, and the future that never was, has been a staple for Hauntologists, wistfully deluded Marxists, and nostalgic Baby Boomers, for quite a while, and I probably fit into at least one of those categories myself.

But such reflections all come after the event of initial recognition (however rapidly).  As I've long reflected, it's that immediate moment of visual/atmospheric impact that really stimulates any  subsequent thought processes involved in my artistic noodlings.  In this case, a simple, unpredicted shortcut during one of my early evening cycle rides - and the choice to turn a certain corner at a particular angle, was enough to create the sense impression sufficient to reframe the building in an entirely new light.  The partial silhouetting of the staircase tower against a pale golden sky, in conjunction with the building's overall mass, and shadowy receding balconies, was sufficient to arrest my progress, and turn a glance into a gaze.  The reality is, I've passed Cobden House a thousand times, and even parked beneath it - while visiting nearby suppliers, as part of my day job.  But this was the first time I've actually pulled out a camera - as if encountering the sight/site for the first time.  That recognition of something ineffable and resonant, within the mundane, and possibly over-familiar, is at the heart of what I'm fumbling to express here.

In this occasion, the only camera available was on my phone.  With slightly shaky hands - and in rapidly fading light, I grabbed what I could (shown in essentially unedited form immediately above) - resolving to return with 'the big camera' to take some 'proper' shots, as soon as possible.  The paradox is, naturally, that you can't recapture a moment - but simply reflect further upon it.  Two days later - on one of the hottest, sun-drenched days of the year, I was certainly able to take more considered, and better composed, focused, or exposed shots.  I was also able to pay greater attention to the building's details, including the masses of boxes stacked against its upper windows (stimulating new narratives about possible current functions), and to the way the coiled razor wire around its perimeter wall create the impression of a fortified citadel.  But the quality of those shots is palpably altered, and as a result - so is their emotional effect.  Ultimately they are more about investigation, than about recognition.  Simple light levels may play a large part - to be sure, as must intention.  But I think there's something far more subjective at play also.  It's about remaining receptive to a certain kind of 'vibe' - often when least expected, or in (supposedly) the least promising circumstances.  It's the inability to adequately analyse that away in objective terms - and yet, to repeatedly experience such small-but-significant revelations within the everyday, which keeps me endlessly circulating through the back streets, housing complexes, and industrial estates of an unglamorous Midlands city, year after year.