Photographer’s exhibit in Old Market captures ghosts of architecture’s past

Photographer Rob Gilmer has an eerie sixth sense about doomed architecture.

As soon as he moved to Omaha in 1983, he grabbed his camera and ventured into the city to photograph old buildings. He was instantly attracted to structures that were destined for destruction.

“I had no idea what the fate of these buildings would be when I took the pictures,” Gilmer said. “I was just photographing the structures I found to be the most interesting and beautiful.”

Gilmer’s photographs are now on display in “Razed,” an exhibit at 616 Gallery in the Old Market. The 27 high-quality black-and-white photos serve as a time portal into the city’s early 20th-century golden age of Renaissance style and art deco architecture.

A whole series of photographs is devoted to the massive buildings that were eventually ripped out of Jobbers Canyon — the commercial area around Farnam and South Eighth Streets. Gilmer shot many of these photos from an angle looking up, so at first blush the buildings look like medieval European fortresses.

It’s worth noting that Gilmer didn’t title or reveal the names of any of the buildings in his Jobbers Canyon collection. Gilmer refers to the destruction in Jobbers Canyon as a “heinous crime.” He displays the buildings as anonymous victims.

Death is ever present in Gilmer’s photo of the old John A. Gentleman Mortuary, the former Farnam Street funeral home that was located in a Victorian mansion. Gilmer’s photo highlights the clock outside the mortuary, which is frozen at 6 minutes after 8 o’clock.

“That clock always reminded me of Rutger Hauer’s last line in ‘Blade Runner,’ when he says, ‘Time to die,’” Gilmer said.

Gilmer’s show documents both the life and death of the old Butternut Building on South 10th Street. He photographed the building in its glory and when it was being consumed by flames in January 2004.

Gilmer took pictures of the cattle chutes of the south Omaha Stockyards and also of huge grain elevators because he believes they define the architecture of the region. “Towering grain elevators are the skyscrapers of the Midwest.”

He photographed the fountain and ancient Greek-style statues outside Mister C’s Steak House because they reminded him of his original home in Long Island, N.Y.

“When my mom visited, she saw the statues and said, ‘This place is more Long Island than Long Island,’” Gilmer said.

Gilmer also had fun with some photos. He shot the old Q Twin Drive-In from the window of his car, giving the viewer the impression of actually being at the drive-in. And he superimposed a photo of people in wedding tuxedos over a photo of the Stockyards to create a piece called “Ghosts of the Cattle Barons.”

Contact the writer:

444-1076, john.pitcher@owh.com

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