I bumped into Spiral Walcher the other day and he showed me some of his new work. Here is a little video of them. I found them mesmerizing and beautiful. Spiral has been making these things and pretty much just putting them away afterwords. So I gave him a good prodding andAlign Center he has placed them in a few venues for people to see.
One place we put them is in an old building at Ryder Asylum. Yes this is the same place I used to have my secret store. For some reason I have a fondness for this place. I think its because it reminds me of an abandoned mental asylum I once explored in rl with my friends. I used to be in this Urban Infiltration group where you go explore abandoned or forgotten areas. I am getting sidetracked but here is the place I explored. Whitby Psychiatric Hospital Actually, I will talk about this for a moment as it was really fun. So in Urban Infiltration you generally research the place you plan on exploring. For example, in Toronto there is an abandoned subway stop called Lower Bay. The subways don't even go past it but you can get there if you do some fairly stupid things like run down the subway tracks. Doing the research tells you how much risk you want to take to see these things. I was not keen on running on the subway tracks but for the Asylum it was more about getting past security. Security was an old man and his dog. He occasionally would wander the perimeter to make sure people didnt go in. By listening to other peoples experiences you would learn that he was willing to chase you a bit but if you got into a building and ran into the tunnels he lost interest. One of those shake fist and yell "damn kids!" types. The key to enjoying this is to get yourself a headlamp and more importantly bring your friends who get creeped out by places like this. We went down some tunnels and found a morgue. We huddled around in the dark smoking cigarettes and were constantly hearing spooky sounds while being pleasantly excited and scared. The place was huge. I remember finding a bowling alley underground. It was from around 1920 or so and was made of beautiful wood. I think there were around 6 lanes too!. Its just so fun to turn a corner and come across something like a bowling alley in the dark. Its both surreal and spooky. Sadly, they have since tore it down and put in a subdivision.
Anyway, back to Spiral. Here are some slurls to his cool Glowy McGlowglows. When he comes back online i will add a few more.


Rockcliffe gardens

Spiral's Galaxy (Ryder asylum)

Mod Hotter

Tunnel of Light




Comments

Anonymous said…
Ooh Bryn, I loved your story! I once explored the ruins of a female mental asylum up on a spooky hilltop on a full moon night - it must have been very similar. But I also loved the photography that you linked to! Thanks for the that, and the *actual* purpose of the post too
Bryn Oh said…
Thanks Val. The parts that were untouched by graffiti were really spectacular. I did get a bit sidetracked but yes go see Spiral's stuff! that was the main point of the post.
Phillip Vought said…
The urban explorer story explains a lot about what you do in second life.. You've opened my eyes to some interesting builds and introduced me to some very interesting people, including Spiral..

Looking forward to more of your finds

Popular Posts