AN INSIDIOUS AGENDA

You were about eight. You suffered night terrors - these awful fits of pure fear. You were terrified of an old woman you said used to come visit you at night.

I dismissed your stories. I told you to grow up.

Then I saw her for myself. 

 

At first I thought it was a camera problem. Then I saw her again.

  In each photo, she got closer...

...and closer...

 ...and closer to you. 

In the back of your mind, you're still afraid to have your picture taken...

... aren't you?

YVES LECOQ

So much more.

GHOST PHOTOGRAPHY: PART III

"No ghost was ever seen by two pair of eyes."

- Thomas Carlyle

YIKES

Yikes indeed.

MEMENTO MORI: PART V

I will not ask where thou liest low,
Nor gaze upon the spot;
There flowers or weeds at will may grow,
So I behold them not:
It is enough for me to prove
That what I lov'd, and long must love,
Like common earth can rot;
To me there needs no stone to tell,
'T is Nothing that I lov'd so well. 

- Lord Byron, And Thou Art Dead, As Young And Fair

GHOST PHOTOGRAPHY: PART II

“Then away out in the woods I heard that kind of a sound that a ghost makes when it wants to tell about something that's on its mind and can't make itself understood, and so can't rest easy in its grave, and has to go about that way every night grieving.”

- Mark Twain

GHOST PHOTOGRAPHY

"You can't take a picture of this. It's already gone."

 

More photos (and their origins).

MEMENTO MORI: PART III

Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality
- Emily Dickinson

PHANTOMS OF THE HUDSON VALLEY

Monica Randall's evocative, sepia-tinted photographs capture the architectural splendor of twenty-six palatial estates that loom as mysterious ruins along the Hudson River. These stately mansions recall the aristocratic luxury of a bygone era, with their turrets and spires, rambling porticos, gleaming columns, and glaring gargoyles. Through her masterful photography and darkroom work, Randall has created some of the restless phantoms she learned about while interviewing the current owners. Pairing the visual spectacle of these ruined mansions with tales of the ghosts that haunt them, Monica Randall celebrates the glamour and mystery of these glorious old estates in this lavish book.

Get.