One Shot Story – Soulless Places

Official brand stores are a powerful way to assert a company’s presence. They are a bold statement of strength and confidence. They send a message to the customers and to those who aren’t yet: look! whenever you go we’re there for you(r wallett).

Admittedly, when travelling abroad it is sometimes reassuring to find a ‘familiar’ place – a cafeteria, a fast food, an electronic gadget shop – where everything works ‘as it should’.

On the other hand, though, this strength has a serious downfall.

Where was this picture taken? Of course, you may guess the location from a few clues (for instance, it was likely taken in a small Italian town, the store was not an official one because of its small size and so on) but otherwise, it is as anonymous as any other of the same brand.

Now, imagine waking up in a street with the same cafeterias, the same fast food, the same electronics shop, the same pizzerias, the same cheap clothing and gadget chain… well you get the idea.

What is the point of travelling thousands of miles only to discover that you haven’t moved at all? Where are things, people, living styles that make you discover different views of the World and challenge your assumptions? How can you immerse yourself in a place when there is nothing that makes it peculiar?

These questions – and many others – are answered in Along the Road, a brilliant essay by Aldous Huxley that should be a mandatory reading for those who travel and even more so for those who don’t.

Although Huxley doesn’t talk about (travel) photography, his remarks about how to find interest things in the most diverse situations are inspiring and give a refreshed sense to the act of travelling and, therefore to photographing. The pervasiveness and the growth of anonymous official stores however, is making increasingly difficult to find a living spirit in places populated by soulless clones.

This is not a rant about the gone ‘good’ol times’ or the damage made by the consumerism economy. Markets’ rules follow (and at the same time, shape) people’s attitudes and decisions are taken accordingly. I’m fine with that. Nevertheless, the growing feeling of alienation is more and more disturbing, excerbated by the hundreds of thousands of same-looking pictures that flood the Internet and make the World look the same.

How can you feel the spirit of a place if ithere is none?