2024
The photographer Phillip Buehler has devoted his career to exploring obsolete sites, what he calls “modern ruins.” Captured in states of evocative decay, his subjects have included an abandoned psychiatric asylum, a Cold War missile silo and an offline power plant.
In late 2019, Buehler's body of work on view in the exhibition “Mallrat to Snapchat: The End of the Third Place” — at Front Room Gallery, in New York — may have elicited more nostalgia than the others. It was a look at New Jersey’s defunct Wayne Hills Mall and, by extension, at the dying culture of middle-class suburban shopping centers across the country.
"I started photographing abandoned places the same year the mall opened, 1973, when I was a senior in high school," Buehler told The Study. "At the time, New York was falling apart, with empty piers and abandoned or burned-out buildings everywhere. Back then, nobody was photographing them, so I had no art references — most were cinematic. Two films released in 1968 made a big impression on me: 2001: A Space Odyssey and Planet of the Apes."
Browse a collection of Phillip Buehler's photography on 1stDibs.
"Rat Island" a limited edition photograph from Rat Island, 2023
By Phillip Buehler
Located in New York, NY
18"x24" limited edition historic photograph, edition 1/5. This photograph depicts an aerial view of the private Rat Island. In 2016, Alex Schibli (the Swiss owner) placed a statue Wi...
Photographic Paper
"Rat Island" Contemporary Photograph, from "Islands of New York" series
By Phillip Buehler
Located in New York, NY
30"x40" limited edition photograph, edition 1/5. This photograph depicts Rat Island and is featured in the series, "Islands of New York". Emerald green waters surrounds this small island in New York. In 2016, Alex Schibli, the Swiss owner of this private island, placed a statue William Tell on the island (it is currently laying on its side waiting to be reinstalled upright). The statue is a reproduction of a monument located in Altdorf, Switzerland, that honors him as a freedom fighter. Phillip Buehler is a New York based photographer who documents the deterioration and remnants of neglected architecture constructed in the recent past. In the series “No Man is an Island...” Buehler has photographed the historic, and also often forgotten islands, around New York City. Some of them, like Ellis Island, loom large in their impact on history, culture and existence in the national identity. Others, like “Rat Island,” a privately-owned 2.5 acre islet north of The Bronx, with an unusual statue...
Photographic Paper
"Lighthouse" a limited edition photograph from Execution Rocks, 2023
By Phillip Buehler
Located in New York, NY
18"x24" limited edition historic photograph, edition 1/5. This photograph depicts a lighthouse on Execution Rock, a name derived from colonial New York, when slave-owning settlers we...
Photographic Paper
"Crematorium" a limited edition photograph from Swimburne Island, 2023
By Phillip Buehler
Located in New York, NY
18"x24" limited edition historic photograph, edition 1/5. This photograph depicts a man-made island that served as a quarantine station. It was built in 1872 after the old Quarantine...
Photographic Paper
"Sub Chaser USS PC-1264" a limited edition from Staten Island, 2024
By Phillip Buehler
Located in New York, NY
18"x24" limited edition historic photograph, edition 1/5. This photograph depicts a U.S. Navy Sub Chaser in a boat graveyard in Staten Island. During World War II, PC-1264 (along wit...
Photographic Paper
"Potters Field" a limited edition photograph from Hart Island, 2024
By Phillip Buehler
Located in New York, NY
18"x24" limited edition historic photograph, edition 1/5. This photograph depicts a burial site where over a million people have been buried since the late 1800s, more recently victi...
Photographic Paper
Our own private island
By Klaus Leidorf
Located in New York, NY
This aerial photograph was taken by Klaus Leidorf from an airplane (which he also flies). It was not staged or manipulated and can be custom size.
Archival Pigment
Italian Contemporary Photography by Luca Battaglia - Untitled, New York Series 6
By Luca Battaglia
Located in Paris, IDF
Pro pigmentary draw Premium Ultra Smooth Hahnemühle 305 g, edition of 7 Luca Battaglia is an Italian architect and photographer born in 1970 who lives and works in Paris, France. Lu...
Photographic Paper
PT1 by Max Steven Grossman
By Max Steven Grossman
Located in Woodmere, OH
Acrylic Mounted Photograph
Other Medium
Grand Island
By Ben Depp
Located in Sante Fe, NM
I have spent seven years photographing visual clues that tell of the beauty, complexity and destruction of South Louisiana. Once formed by sediment deposited by the Mississippi River...
Archival Pigment
PT2 by Max Steven Grossman
By Max Steven Grossman
Located in Woodmere, OH
Acrylic Mounted Photograph
Other Medium
Andrew Moore - Midwood Landing, Photography 2023, Printed After
By Andrew Moore
Located in Greenwich, CT
Germantown home Size & Edition: 40" x 50” - Edition of 5 + 2 Artist Proofs This photograph will be printed once payment has been received and will ship directly from the printe...
Archival Pigment
