Finding Walden: Photographs from The Chicago Park System

"Our village life would stagnate if it were not for the unexplored forests and meadows which surrounds it. We need the tonic of wildness..." From Walden, or Life in the Woods by Henry David Thoreau

For those who live in the city of Chicago, the parks provide the only semblance of nature that is easily accessible. I began photographing with the intent of describing the parks as a landscape. Later, I began to consider this question: “Can the city parks yield the same meaning, as say, Walden Pond did for Henry David Thoreau?”

The city parks are a unique landscape where concrete mixes with planted trees, with the Chicago skyline often present in the background. This is a landscape that is not quite wilderness, yet is somewhat removed from the normal urban context. The space of the parks is open and expansive, at least compared to other parts of the city. How the space is used and how I interpret this use is my primary concern.

My final conclusion is that though the parks are still quite urban, in both the landscape and the psychological experience of the person visiting them, they play an integral and important part in the lives of city dwellers.

Thoreau says that “in wildness is the salvation of the world.” My photographs provide a framework, but I want to leave it up to the viewer to decide if this “salvation” is possible within the concrete confines of the city.