Yea, Though I Picnic in the Valley of the Shadow of Death

This is likely to become a regular feature. If I were a medievalist in Europe, I'd spend my weekends out photographing castles and I wouldn't have to explain why I was posting the pictures on my medievalist blog. Obviously we don't have great old medieval ruins in America, but the aesthetic pull of the decrepit things that people used to inhabit is still great. So I seek out more modern ruins, though it's not totally separate from my intellectual life.

The New York City Marble Cemetery is one of two so-called marble cemeteries at the top of the Lower East Side that were built entirely from the marble quarried at Tuckahoe, NY. The one on 2nd St., a 19th-century non-denominational site, held an open day today; the strangest thing was that many people treated it like just another green space in the city and picnicked there.

I'm still still getting used to the camera, and the hours for the open day (11-5 in the middle of the summer) made the lighting conditions a challenge. In fact, there are a few images that I'll post here that will do well with a light touch of the dodging tool in photoshop. So with all the usual caveats, more photos after the jump.

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