Metropolis

Acquiring the necessary photographic equipment was fundamental to my project. I had all these shades and layers of Mecca in mind as I put the system together, thinking about the scale, angles, and conditions within which I would have to shoot to convey the plurality of the city. In a sort of scavenger hunt, parts were acquired from all over the world. After this international search, I found the best camera I could have imagined: one that the Saudi Binladin Group acquired in the 1970s to take photographs of its construction projects in Mecca. It had never been used, and it felt so fitting to use it to shoot the city it was intended for, to reclaim something that had lain dormant for almost forty years and apply it to this task. But there was a difference: I was shooting to map, trace, and document stories; the Saudi Binladin Group would have used the equipment to map and document the physical reality of the place.