Dennis Gordon is a retired Fire Lieutenant with the FDNY. He completed over 37 years of service in the most active areas of the city.

In the 1980’s while living in the lower east side of Manhattan he studied acting and engaged in a number of performances, mostly downtown avant-garde performance art. He performed at: PS 122, The Pyramid Club, King Tut’s Wah Wah hut, the Red Bar, Dixon Place, Darinka Place, Club 57 and others.

Dennis has had since being a young boy a fascination with exploring abandoned buildings. This fascination was organically fed by living in the lower east side and working as a firefighter in the South Bronx in the 1970’s and 80’s where abandoned buildings were more the rule than exception.

Starting in the 90’s he started traveling throughout the northeast, the south and the rust belt photographing abandoned structures with a particular interest in industries. He shares a collaborative website with a friend chronicling these photos; darkbuilding.com

Using these photos for reference Dennis recreates the feelings and emotions experienced while exploring these buildings in the form of miniature models in 1/87th scale. While the models are not prototypical in nature, he captures the elements of weather, age and distress to deliver the attitude of these derelict and abandoned structures.