Finding Beauty Where Others See Ruins

How photographing abandoned and decaying spaces taught me to see beauty in the overlooked and forgotten.

This article was originally published on Medium, where it gained significant traction and was featured as a member-only story. I'm excited to share it here on Substack and continue the journey of exploring unconventional beauty with you.

Things that are usually quickly dismissed from our interest (like broken windows) can sometimes become objects of our admiration. Photo taken by the author in Zagreb with a Fujifilm XE-4, using a 27mm F2.8 lens.

Challenging Conventional Beauty

There are some things that are almost universally considered beautiful or admirable by society. Here, I’m talking about things such as breathtaking landscapes, blooming flowers, vividly painted tropical fish, beautiful men and women, lavish houses, expensive cars, and shiny jewelry, and many others.

What qualifies such things as admirable are certain common traits, such as being rare, aesthetically appealing, valuable, or in some way unique. By possessing these rare and positive qualities, they stand out as a minority among the many things that surround us, which are often considered less beautiful and sometimes even ugly.

My question is:

If we only admire those things that are deemed worthy of admiration from the mainstream point of view, do we risk impoverishing our lives by failing to appreciate the rest of the world?

To answer that question, it’s enough to head to the city center of any larger town and notice the streams of people walking hurriedly through the streets, immersed in their thoughts and electronic devices, unaware of the architecture, parks, and lights around them. This is a reflection of the mainstream. Living like this, we really diminish our own lives. Instead of being present and enjoying our surroundings, we often live for future events, always waiting for something extraordinary, including in an aesthetic sense.

Can we do something about it?

Discovering Beauty in Unexpected Places

Here, I want to share an interesting phenomenon I discovered through the photography of not-so-beautiful, or even ugly, things and objects, specifically, ruins photography.

Ruins photography, sometimes called ruin porn, is a movement in photography that takes the decay of the built environment (cities, buildings, infrastructure, etc.) as its subject.

This is a photograph of the interior of the never-completed university hospital in Zagreb. During its construction, war broke out, and the funds allocated for the project were redirected elsewhere. Today, it stands empty and in ruins, occasionally visited by adventurers or softball enthusiasts. What looks impressive are the massive concrete walls, contrasted with the texture of tiny broken glass pieces. Photo taken by the author with an iPhone 11.

The Power of Perspective in Finding Beauty in the Ordinary

We usually tend to dismiss ruined things due to their ugliness and worthlessness, and indeed, why would somebody admire or even photograph ruined objects? I can provide my reasons that may give you a fresh perspective on otherwise dismissed objects.

Namely, I’ve noticed that the more I took photos of them, the more I was able to find beauty in them.
I believe that our ability to find beauty in ordinary, or even ugly things, can make our lives richer and more meaningful, as we will more frequently have a reason for admiration — whether it is conventionally beautiful and interesting, or ugly and dull.

Interesting textures and colors I found on doors in the city of Rijeka, which I would have previously passed by without noticing. Photo taken by the author with a Fujifilm XE-4 and a 27mm F2.8 lens.

Artistry and Spontaneity in the Decay of Ruins

What also attracts me to ruins photography is the touch of artistry and spontaneity I find in these objects. When things are first made, they are all the same and sterile, but the more they decay, the more unique they become, to the point where I sometimes wonder if I’m looking at a work of art.

It may be blasphemous to claim, but to me, the scene in this photograph is more impressive than many famous works of art. The combination of graffiti, crumbling walls, and collapsed stairs makes this scene a true and unique piece of art. Photo taken by the author in an abandoned building in Bol on the island of Brač, using an iPhone 11.

Adventure and Excitement in Exploring Forgotten Ruins

Additionally, discovering ruins carries a sense of adventure that greatly appealed to me in my youth. Very often, ruins are located in remote and neglected places that require effort to reach and also present a certain level of danger.

This reminds me of my youthful trips to an abandoned hospital bunker full of chemicals, or the secret nighttime visits to the medicinal herb botanical garden. Finding and exploring these places often gave me a feeling of excitement.

I had to put in quite a bit of effort, squeezing through branches and bushes, and going where it isn’t allowed, just to find this ruined locomotive. Photo taken by the author with an iPhone 11 at the Zagreb railyard.

Silent Stories of Nostalgia and History Within Ruins

There is something truly special about ruins, isn’t it? It’s as if every piece of rusty metal, crack in the wall, abandoned chair, or locomotive tells its own silent story about the past and the people who once used them.

Ruins often exude a sense of nostalgia, reminding us of the passage of time. In this way, they are a connection between the present and the past. By observing the ruins, we can picture the vibrant lives that once thrived, now fading into mere echoes of the past.

Broken and discarded chairs in the village of Velo Grablje on the island of Hvar make a passerby wonder who used them and for what purpose, and what life used to look like in this now mostly abandoned village. Photo taken by the author using a Fujifilm XH2 with a 16–80mm F4 lens.

Takeaway: Enriching Life by Seeing Beyond the Surface

An abandoned passenger airplane rests with dignity at Belgrade Airport, observing a new era. Photo taken by the author with an iPhone 5.

Ruins photography is a form of art that invites us to see beauty in things that are abandoned, broken, or decaying. An old rusty car, peeling paint on a deserted house, or broken-down locomotives left in isolation — all of these can be transformed into objects of beauty through ruins photography.

This shift in perception challenges the conventional idea that beauty is tied to rarity, value, or perfection.

Ruins photography teaches me that beauty doesn’t reside in things themselves but in how I perceive them.

For me, it’s truly fulfilling that instead of photographing flashy and cheesy things or moments that grab attention right away, I try to find beauty in places where it’s not expected. And when I manage to find it, the results are often more impressive than with the conventional approach.

So, let’s set aside the conventional story and ask ourselves, is there something in such objects that we find worthy of admiration? What about shadows, contrasts, colors and shapes? Can we further highlight the impressiveness of the scene, or perhaps its beauty and ugliness? Are there spontaneous and artistically scattered signs of wear from the passage of time? Is there something that can draw the observer into the story?

Answering such questions requires us to be present, and the more present we are, the more we can uncover the art and uniqueness found in ruins. Simply put, our lives will be richer because we will find more things worthy of admiration.

And there are not many things that are more valuable than that.

Thank you for reading my story.