Days Gone By - Roadside Photographs of the American South

Many times over a period of ten years, Jörg Rubbert has traveled the suburban and urban spaces between Georgia, Mississippi and Texas, documenting them with his medium format camera. Small town idylls at first glance are revealed on closer inspection to be the forgotten remnants of times long past. The faded glory of the “Good Old South” is captured here, both in its morbid beauty and as a manifestation of the ephemeral. The carefully crafted images reflect unsparingly the de- mise of the South’s small towns, their suffering particu- larly tangible following the financial and economic crisis. The intense colors in the images, which capture the southern sunlight, seem to jar uncomfortably with the “gray” reality they portray. Yet they act as a powerful plea not to allow the buildings and infrastructure of these places to be wholly abandoned, a call to truly embrace the historic legacy they embody.