06 Oct Forgotten spaces: abandoned medical centres captured by Ilan Benattar

Empty chairs, lonely crutches and unoccupied beds pepper the eerie photographs of Ilan Benattar, whose Medical Centers series documents disused clinics around Europe.

The images offer an ghostly take on once-bustling buildings, with rows of patients and busy corridors replaced by peeling plaster and dusty tiles.

In one image – which French photographer says reminds him of the work of Stanley Kubrick – a pair of lights glare down on a red carpeted room, empty except for a surgical table. In another, a lone wheelchair sits in front of a brightly coloured window.

Ilan Benattar found the locations through a mixture of hearsay, recommendations from friends, and google research.

‘I wanted to photograph them because of the toughness of the places, the harsh stories, and what we can imagine when seeing these pictures,’ says the photographer, who regularly shoots disused buildings.

For Benattar, precise timing and light are critical to each of his images.

‘The mood of the buildings is quite unique,’ he explains. ‘I wanted to convey the the austere atmosphere of the medical field in the old days.

By Emma Tuckers

https://thespaces.com/abandoned-medical-centres-captured-by-ilan-benattar/