San Diego Unseen: An Urban Portrait
In the winter of 2008, Roy Kerckhoffs took his Nikon to an out-of-service steel production plant in Germany. It was cold and foggy, and Kerckhoffs spent the day climbing up old blast furnaces and exploring the industrial plant, which had been turned into a public park about a decade prior.
“Nature was just allowed to take over again,” Kerckhoffs said. “They let all the structures decay and rust, and they just let plants grow everywhere.”
“Silos,” the photo on the cover of this week CityBeat, was one of the photos Kerckhoffs took that day. He actually has a coffee-table book, Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord: Photosynthese, featuring images of the plant.
Industry, nature and history are what inspire most of Kerckhoffs’ photos. He prefers to present them in stark black and white. Often, he gets tight, close-up shots, which pick up the patterns that naturally occur in nature and man-made structures.
“Some people describe my work as dark and eerie,” he says, “but beautiful, too. And I like that.”
Kerckhoffs considers himself a semi-professional photographer. He’s a researcher in the bioengineering department at UCSD by day, so most of his photography is done on weekends and in his spare time. But, a few years ago, he started wondering if people other than his family and friends would appreciate and maybe even buy his photos. He approached local businesses and asked if he could show his work.
“Silos” was on view at Bread & Cie in Hillcrest when someone purchased it. He’s currently showing his stuff at Pizza Gourmet Express (4615 Park Blvd. in University Heights).
Last year, Kerckhoffs decided to take his photography career one step further when he applied and was accepted to the Mission Federal ArtWalk, and he’s since gone on to show is work in other art fairs. This year, he’s a featured artist in the Mission Federal ArtWalk. At last year’s event, people asked him for water or coastal themes. At first, he wasn’t interested, but he came around and decided to try to photograph the coast in his own, enigmatic style.
“Last year, I probably had 1,000 people go through my booth, and I really enjoyed talking to people and hearing what they had to say about my work, so I’m interested to hear what they think this year.”
Kerckhoffs’ work will be on view at the Mission Federal ArtWalk from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. April 30 and May 1.
