Signs of Chattanooga’s rich history are not always visible. Our collective memory of the past is under threat from the relentless flow of time. However, there are also other factors that have contributed to this historical erasure, such as land development. A Forgetful Place: 35°02’44″N 85°18’33″W bears witness to this today.

Historical erasure is a natural process that occurs as time unfolds. A visit to the Chickamauga Battlefield and walking through its beautiful, wooded areas bear little evidence of the brutality and staggering loss of human life that occurred there. Nature has erased signs of the Civil War battle, forcing forgetfulness. But there are also instances where human progress acts in the same vein. As the city of Chattanooga grew, many significant historical places have become buried in development. For example, at Ross’s Landing, nothing remains of the Cherokee removal that occurred there besides a small plaque. In other instances, some significant sites have been preserved or marked with monuments or via parks. They are important tourist sites in Chattanooga, but often seem to have the opposite effect by trivializing history. Leisure is oblivious to the history of these places.

For this project, I used a large-format film camera that belonged to my grandfather, as well as hand processed and scanned the film. I chose to use this laborious and outdated process as a technical challenge that would connect this contemporary documentation with the past.

–Bruno Poco