Summer 6s - with Franklin Jones and Post-Echo

It’s summer in the city and sometimes during this time of year we find ourselves with the weird sensation of (gasp!) free time on our hands.  Rather than letting this phenomenon catch you unawares on some stray Saturday afternoon, Jasper has you covered with our summertime series alliteratively called the Summer Sixes in which we ask members of the Columbia arts community to share their favorite top 6 films, reads, albums, or TV series binges.  We’ll be bringing you this throughout the summer so pay attention to What Jasper Said to learn more about what your friends and neighbors like to do with their spare time, and maybe get some ideas of what to do with yours.

If you know the folks over at Post-Echo at all, it won't surprise you that they took a strange and unexpected tact when we requested a Summer 7 list from them. Franklin Jones compiled his six favorite abandoned places in the Midlands, many of which are featured in the collective's films Passage and their latest, Tyler Digital visual album Exit 8.

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‘Tis the season for exploration. So resolve your deepest abandonment issues and hit the road this summer in search of these six nearby abandoned places. In the spirit of proximity, I have not included any sites further than sixty miles away; the endless array of ruinous coastal eye candy will have to wait for a separate list. Also, please remember to be careful. Just because somewhere is abandoned, does not mean you are alone.

6. Lone Star, SC

Once a bustling community during the heyday of the now-defunct Atlantic Coast Line Railroad, the ghost town of Lone Star has been dormant for quite awhile. The remnants of its downtown area, however, feature four gorgeously dilapidated buildings: a general store, a post office, a freight depot, and what appears to have been an old hotel. Coincidentally, the railroad line (owned by CSX Transporation since 1986) still passes through Lone Star on occasion. Side note: be careful trying to access any of the structures as the wasp nests are plentiful.

5. Olar, SC

While not quite a ghost town, Olar’s population is 212 and plummeting at the rate of 10% per decade- so, just be patient. A haven of forgotten banks, service stations, and general stores, Olar was once a popular whistle-stop on the Seaboard Air Line Railway (aka Route of Courteous Service, also the rival to Lone Star’s Atlantic Coast Line Railroad, got all that?). Unlike Lone Star, an uneasy sense of failure and despair hangs over the dregs of Olar. This hasn’t been a quick death.

4. Chem Trails - Columbia, SC

The Intertape Polymer Group officially pulled up stakes several years ago, moving their packaging plant from the South Beltline location (where it had resided for over 50 years) to a state-of-the-art facility in Blythewood. What was left in the wake of this mass exodus amounts to nothing short of an apocalyptic nightmare. A decrepit maze of soul-sucking office corridors, hastily evacuated laboratories and cavernous testing facilities, all somewhere in the process of being reclaimed by outside vegetation. Even after years of corrosive decay, most of the workstations and cubicles are still intact - in addition to post-it reminders and lab notes, you can also find styrofoam to-go food boxes inside the break room fridge. There’s a little something for everyone here.

3. The Wreck Center - Kershaw, SC

Formerly Flat Creek Park, you can find this sprawling behemoth just off Kershaw Highway en route to Forty Acre Rock. Details are scarce (or at least hard for me to find) on what exactly happened to this former parks & rec facility, but the sheer scope of abandonment on display is staggering. Comprised of a gymnasium, an arts/crafts building, two baseball fields, and what appears to be a dungeon of some kind, all scattered across a quarter mile of high grass and cacti (yes, cacti), there’s a lot to experience here so be sure to pack a lunch.

2. The Locker Room - Hopkins (maybe?), SC

Also affectionately known as the Circuit Cell in tribute to its rusty exposed wiring, The Locker Room lurks just off Highway 378 next to a formerly abandoned gas station and a now-abandoned Hot Sub Shop (which itself was formerly a Subway). A short-lived bar and grill that met a fiery end, nearby locals have provided me with conflicting information over the years on just what happened to the Locker Room. With stories ranging from arson to the aforementioned faulty wiring, the origins of the inferno remain a mystery. As it stands now, the Locker Room is an immense husk of grimey, moss-laden concrete, its interior scattered with remnants that survived the blaze. You can actually still access this structure through the front door - but, to fully experience the Locker Room in all its opulent decay, I recommend entering via the gaping cinder block hole located at the back of the building.

1. The Ruins - Columbia, SC

The full breadth of The Ruins is difficult to quantify. Tucked away deep off Bluff Road and surrounded by swamps and farmland, this monolithic structure operated as an Eisenhower-era seed repository before heightened industrialization rendered it obsolete. In the years since, the roofless concrete framework has developed a dense canopy of foliage, currently teeming with wildlife. Additionally, the architectural design of the structure has allowed each of its five compartments to accommodate individualized ecosystems, each different than the last. This is a very special place.

Honorable Mention: The Dead Pool - Columbia, SC

This one really flies under the radar. Located behind Columbia’s historic 701 Whaley building are the crumbling remnants of an indoor pool and gymnasium, approximately sixty years old. The gym was briefly re-purposed as a machine shop before being abandoned several years ago when renovations were announced. However, the real gem to discover is the adjacent pool structure. Truly something to behold, the Dead Pool is anything but lifeless- as a collapsed roof has yielded the necessary conditions for an assortment of plant life to thrive unabated, slowly consuming the interior of the tile structure.

Tamara Finkbeiner wins Audience Award at Jasper's 2nd Act Film Festival

 

Congratulations to Tamara Finkbeiner whose film Eva's Plug, won the Audience Award at Friday night's 2nd Act Film Festival sponsored by Jasper Magazine. Selected via audience ballot, the 2nd Act Film Festival Audience Award includes a check for $250, a First Draft editing program, and a one-of-a-kind trophy designed by Columbia artist, Matthew Kramer. According to film festival director Wade Sellers, "With any short film fest there are many films that could win an audience award, that was the same with this year's 2nd Act Film Fest. There is usually a film, however, that just connects with an audience in that room at that moment and that was the case with Tamara's film Eva's Plug. You could feel the energy and enthusiasm for the film build as it played. That experience is what 2nd Act is all about."

This was the second 2nd Act Film Festival (the first was in October 2013) which played once again to a capacity house at Tapp's Arts Center and included the films of 10 adjudicated filmmakers from South Carolina including Lucas Sams, Brian Harmon, Jason Stokes, Bessy Adut, Phyllis Jackson, Caletta Harris-Bailey, Bradley Wagster,  Dustin Weibel, Jordan Young, and Tamara Finkbeiner. The selected filmmakers, who applied to participate earlier this season, were chosen over other applicants based on their abilities and the freshness of the voice the jurors thought they would bring to the project. Jurors included Lee Ann Kornegay, Lee Snelgrove,  Caitlin Bright, Wade Sellers, and Cindi Boiter. 

"This year we put more pressure on ourselves to assist the filmmakers," Sellers says. "We offered script notes, production advice and assistance, and editorial suggestions once the films were turned in. As a whole the films were more diverse in voice and just better as a whole than our first event." Sellers is the owner and director of Coal Powered Filmworks, a three-time Emmy nominated filmmaker, and the film editor for Jasper Magazine.

In keeping with Jasper's efforts to foster a multi-disciplinary arts community, both visual artists and musicians played a part in the festival and its presentation.  Visual artist Michael Krajewski created an original painting which was used for the festival poster and program; visual artist Matthew Kramer created the Audience Award; and Pedro Ldv entertained festival attendees both before the event and during intermission. In addition, original music from several Columbia-based musicians, including Stan Gardner, Daniel Machado and more, was used as background music during the films themselves.

Columbia-based writer Don McCallister also served as a consultant on the first and third acts of the screenplay which was given to the filmmakers with the challenge that they write the second act and create a film, six minutes long or less, using all three acts. Participants in the 2013 2nd Act Film Festival including Ron Hagell and OK Keyes lent the knowledge of their experience to this year's filmmakers by consulting on films and screenplays.

In the aftermath of Columbia's devastating flood last week other artists including Michael Krajewski,  Bonnie Goldberg, Kara Gunter, Nancy Marine, and Sean McGuiness voluntarily stepped up and offered the fruits of their labors to benefit flood victims through a silent auction which generated $1060 which will be delivered to the Central Carolina Community Foundation. Two large bins of children's arts supplies was also collected from audience members for distribution to children effected by the flood.

The festival staff would like to thank Precision Overhead Garage Door Service, the Mouse House, Coal Powered Filmwork, and Bourbon Columbia for their sponsorship funds and services.

"It was exciting to see these ten filmmakers create these films," Sellers says, "and it only makes us more excited for the future of the event."

In Jasper Vol. 3, No. 4: Record Review - We Roll Like Madmen's The Kids Must Die

"Recently signed to Post-Echo, this remarkably compelling experimental electronic dance music duo called Clemson home prior to their relocation to Columbia late last year. It’s a welcome addition to our local scene, particularly with the release of The Kids Must Die, a 5 song EP that sees the group adding hip-hop flourishes (and guest MCs) to their sonic arsenal. While the most characteristic part of their sound is Jordan Young’s emotive vocals, which are often pitched and processed in interesting ways, it’s the way the he and partner Chris Tollack build sonic landscapes of pulsating synths, roving bleeps and blurps, and oddball percussion to create a thoroughly heady mix that really excites. Bringing to mind the adventurous innovation of Daft Punk in spirit if not always in practice, their compositions always seem relentless more than anything, rarely stopping their idiosyncratic twists and turns to catch a breath.

Still, it’s the two guest MCs who are going to get much of the buzz here—scene mainstay FatRat da Czar sounds reinvigorated by the new territory of Tollack and Young’s beats, with his husky flow taking on a next texture in the reverb-y world of EDM. His wizened confidence sits somewhat uncomfortably next to Young’s pained vocals, but it somehow works to acknowledge the exciting distance the performance bridges. It’s a similar experience for Believe (Grand Prize Winner from Last Year), whose first verse on the opening cut “On” gradually builds the song to its riveting, dubstep-influenced climax, and then proceeds to skitter another verse over top of the throbbing riffs that constitute the song’s coda.

It’s not all pounding rhythms, though—WRLM try out everything here from spacey melodies and ambient white noise to clean dance grooves and genuine pop hooks over the course of these five songs, evincing a wide-eyed sense of adventure that should be fun to follow as the duo continues to evolve." –Kyle Petersen

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