United Nations Secretariat Building, NYC, 2021.
All the pixels, none of the diplomatic immunity, at https://www.flickr.com/photos/mattblaze/51381729335/
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this post was submitted on 19 Mar 2025
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Captured with the Phase One Achromatic back and the Rodenstock 32mm/4.0 HR-Digaron lens, with the back shifted down 8.5mm to maintain the building's geometry. I brought out contrast in the sky with a polarizer, but otherwise used no color contrast filtration. The camera was positioned across the avenue about 10 meters up from the plaza level (at the bottom of the "canyon" of the skyline reflected in the bottom center of the building).
Love them or hate them, mid-century rectangular glass curtain buildings like this are easy to dismiss as being "boring", but I think that misses something.
Reflections of the surroundings become part of the facade, which changes at different angles and throughout the day. I visited several times and made dozens of photos, all quite different, before I settled on this one, and there are infinitely many photos others could make, all unique. (Similar to the new World Trade Center in this regard).
@mattblaze@federate.social I hadn't thought of these buildings as reflecting their environment, I will look more closely, thank you. Maybe we just don't clean the glass enough in Australia 🙂
As a person who worked inside them, they were definitely boring from the inside. And often very glary, light reflected from other buildings.
I guess it's the architect's job to mediate these two perspectives to the benefit of both.