Meadowlands

Joshua Lutz takes the New Topographics of Adams, Shore, and Sternfeld into its current era of urban sprawl.

-The New Yorker Just two miles west of Manhattan lies the Meadowlands, a 32-square-mile stretch of sweeping wilderness that evokes morbid fantasies of Mafia hits and buried remains. Development has claimed two-thirds of the region, making way for scores of landfills, motels, and gas stations. The growth of poorly planned communities and the impending construction of Xanadu, a five million-square-foot entertainment and retail complex, threaten to change these lands forever. Under the pretext of searching for Jimmy Hoffa, photographer Joshua Lutz began exploring these lonesome wetlands ten years ago; what started as a strict documentary project soon evolved into something else entirely. Meadowlands, Lutz's first monograph, is a compelling portrait of this vast and stunning landscape, whose unspoiled area is quickly dwindling. The Meadowlands are a place of solitude, a place you pass through on your way somewhere more inviting-and yet, within it all resides a quiet beauty, a glimmer of hope, a hidden potential for renewal and rebirth.