Domino: A Subtle Performance

On the Brooklyn side of New York, next to the Williamsburg Bridge, the Domino Sugar Factory sat eagerly across from the island of Manhattan for more than a century. An architectural relic of a period of industrialization, in 2014 it was slated for demolition into luxury apartments that would overlook Manhattan from across the East River.

Kara Walker, an American Artist, created an exhibition to encompass all of the themes of industrialization, slavery, sexuality, power and race in a final show at the Domino Factory before its demolition in 2014. A Subtlety, or the Marvelous Sugar Baby, is an homage to the unpaid and overworked Artisans who refined our Sweet tastes from the cane fields to the Kitchens of the New World.

Towards the end of the "A Subtlety" exhibition at the Domino Factory a small group of people were granted exclusive access to the space. As we came through a side entrance we immediately felt our feet sticking to the ground with each step. Dark molasses and sugar seemed to coat everything from the ground all the way up the high ceilings. A suffocating sense of discomfort and beauty existed in the haunted the space.

Armed with a camera, my friends and I tried to capture the last moments of the Domino Factory.

DoP: Sean Nguyen / Jed Mitchell

Color Correction: Samuel Muff

Order of Appearance:

Billy Rohan

Pat Hoblin

John Baragwanath

Special Thanks to Ed Riew and Jessica Forsyth

Shot on Red

Movi M10