Recently, I had to scout locations for my upcoming short documentary film on Hamilton’s Irish Cork-town of the 19th century.
With so much of the architecture and landscape lost to development, I wanted to capture want survived and what might be re-captured via my imagination.
What soon became apparent was how little of Hamilton’s was actually captured by the camera or even drawings. As a result, walking the streets of late 19th and early 20th century Hamilton requires a great leap of imagination.
This won’t be the case in the future.
Using Google Map and Google Street View to chart film locations, I suddenly realized that these images were the first ever publicly documented records of streets and, even entire neighbourhoods.
Google Street View documents everything. There is no editorial or class basis that might favour the corner of James and King over Young and Aurora.
To be poor or unpopular will no longer mean that your urban landscape and architecture will be lost to history.
Google Street View has ensured that a record of all communities will be preserved for future fans of history and urban architecture.
Artist Chris Erskine
@erskinec
FCSD Studio 