Photographer David S. Allee explores the peculiar effects of artificial light on human-made environments. He works with a large-format Linhof Technikardan camera, photographing apartment buildings, houses, stadiums, and gardens, to name a few places, that are bathed in the overflow of floodlights from artificial light sources such as sports and recreation facilities. By leaving open the shutter on the camera for several minutes, Allee captures the impact of artificial light on another artificial scene.

Allee was an urban planner. His interest in designed light on designed spaces seems like a natural progression of his initial interest in urban planning. By arresting the viewers’ gaze on places such as apartment buildings or outdoor picnic areas—places that might have no particular meaning to us otherwise—Allee asks us to consider how two types of design, urban and light, interact with one another. Allee suggests we consider the overlooked, in this instance, the collateral or accidental lighting of spaces not originally intended to be lit. The overflow of light has effects that are perhaps unknown to its designers and impact the residents of the accidentally lit places. By drawing attention to it, Allee suggests that the lights’ effects are multiple and compelling. Because the scenes are largely unpeopled, the photographs have an eerie, deserted look to them, calling into question the efficacy of light’s power to diminish our fears and cast aside the darkness.