Holiday Aventures in a dead mall

[olivermoss]

Ever go to a dead mall:



Where this is part of the Christmas decor:



And then it turns out that the above artist is guy you've been rolling dice with at the local gaming cafe.

Lloyd Center is in a weird zombie state right now. Most of the store fronts are closed, all the anchor stores are closed. I could not buy a diet coke there because only maybe two restaurants are still open. I had to resort to a pepsi vending machine and the pepsi bottle was room temperature.

But, on the other hand there are painting classes, a thrift store, stores featuring local vendors and they have art events like The Void Market and this, uh, festive holiday display. Sadly, Void Market was while I was in Louisiana.

I have the start of a walkthrough here on bluesky and they have a super fast walk through on their insta.

There is a cute section, horror section, wintery section and cozy section with a nice couch and some chairs to chill in. It's a collab by 41 artists. I bought a Krampus painting and will need to pick up when the show ends:


Most of the pics I took where of the creepy stuff. I might go back and shoot the reindeer with my real camera because I love it. And after I did this I went to go play in a 4 session Golden Compass mini-campaign I'm in at TPK, and found out someone in my group made the Krampus section.

Entrance to the Krampus section:



Because my tolerance for spooky is high, I am going to drop the shots below a cut.


I didn't want to be taking too many pics or videos so, uh, behind the skeleton is the bloody manger and in front is a hooded creature who is eating the remains.



The reindeer:


I love the reindeer with candy entrails. I am not sure how clearly this crappy cell phone picture reads.

Nothing quite like Christmas in Portland. Show dates and times.

Oh, and I bought some Portlandy holiday stickers. Apparently, goats are just a holiday thing here now?

Comments

[dine]

it's so strange to see that mall - it was always such a busy, vibrant place back in the day. I'd often get off my bus on the far side, and walk through the mall to get to my house a few blocks on the other side.

it's neat that there is still cool activity - love those photos, and the stickers are great. it's nice to know the Belmont goats are still remembered

[olivermoss]

The mall is in a weird limbo right now, but there is cool stuff there. I feel like a lot of people don't know about it. Even I almost slept on it

[delphi]

Those are fantastic pictures, and fantastic installations.

It reminds me of how they once filmed a horror movie in my hometown and dressed up a long-abandoned downtown street as a nightmare ghost town. Some friends and I went walking along there one night during filming, peering into the empty storefronts and looking at all the creepy set dressing - and periodically being reminded by each other that, no, all those water-damaged, leering mannequin heads lurking menacingly in the darkness of the old hairdressing shop had always been there.

(Honestly, nothing the film crew could do was sadder or more off-putting than the reality, which was that a few years prior the city had painted fake store fronts all down that street, with the silhouettes of fake 1950s-styled customers inside.)

[olivermoss]

Thanks!

That's really creepy. Did it actually work at all, the illusion of life and activity?

[delphi]

Some claimed that it worked to deter crime - made it feel less like you were on an empty street with no one watching, and certainly less access to glass to break - but from an aesthetic point of view, it was just sad. Like the architectural equivalent of Mrs. Havisham in her wedding dress.

[olivermoss]

Sad and creepy, might have made for some fun photos

[delphi]

They ended up tearing down the whole block a few years ago, and unfortunately these are the only photos I could find still kicking around the internet:

https://i.imgur.com/ZgACNQY.jpeg

(I wish this one were available in higher resolution, since it gives more of the effect)
https://i.imgur.com/uMQHM7e.jpeg

Compared to what the same street looked like just ten years or so before the paintings went up, and another twenty years before that:

https://i.imgur.com/rBye7Hn.jpeg

https://i.imgur.com/umObVOK.jpeg

[olivermoss]

That is really weird. If it's just one store, it could look like it was just closed for renovations. But having a line of stores like that looks like aliens tried to re-create an Earth town from images, but didn't understand what the objects were

[mistressofmuses]

This is really neat!

(Our dead malls are very dead. I wish they'd at least get fun arty things!)

The candy entrails are great!
I also like the contrast between the more-realistic-than-usual skeleton and the fluffy cozy entrails that still look gory enough to be offputting (in a good way).

I also love the baba yaga hut!

[olivermoss]

This dead mall could become something cool if more people knew about and gave it a chance. Ten bucks says this becomes something where news blows up about all the art projects, painting classes, etc, as soon as it's all over.

But yeah, this art installation is amazing. This is the holiday walk through at my mall, just, amazing

[mistressofmuses]

It seems like that's way too often the way... a lot of coverage of things after they're done, once it's too late.

It looks like an amazing installation! I'm glad to get to see pictures of it!