Dereliction 1

At first glance this image appears to be an abstract painting or mixed-media collage. But take a closer look, and you realise it’s a photograph.

Taken in 2016 by Patrick James Dilley, the image depicts the remnants of the old Queen Victoria Works in Brook St, Dundee.

The more you look, the more you see

­The image itself consists of three main layers. We’re standing outside looking in through the building’s dark interior, and out again towards the light, as if looking through a tunnel. In the foreground, broken panes of glass or plastic-covered mesh create a layer of textured shapes in blues and browns. Together with an area of exposed stonework, these shapes act as a frame and, being out of focus, lead the eye inwards towards the centre.

In the second layer or mid-ground, the dark interior of the building is dappled with slivers of sunlight streaking through slats in the rotting roof.

As we come to the centre of the image, we see what appear to be strokes of thickly applied paint on canvas panels but are actually the peeling surface of an old interior wall, seen through the rusted bars of a broken window, and lit up by sunshine. The contrast between dark and light is stark.

A black diagonal shape in the right half of the ‘panels’ could almost be an artist’s easel, though it’s more likely to be a mechanical pulley. And just to the right of the ‘easel’ we can even see the ‘artist’!

The overall effect is an optical illusion – a frame within a frame, a world within a world, a window to another dimension. It’s as if we’re looking back through the past to another time and place.

Dundee, past and present

The Victoria Works were built in 1834, at a time when Dundee formed the heart of a thriving jute industry. Still in operation in 1982, it was the world’s oldest functioning flax mill. Production eventually ceased in 1990 but plans to convert the site to housing failed to materialise, and the building fell into disrepair. The site became a target for vandals and graffiti artists until a fire in 2022 left the building no more than a ruin.

Known as Scotland’s sunniest city, Dundee has been undergoing a transformation in recent years, the jewel in the crown being the V&A museum on the waterfront. This unique building with its angular design still divides opinion but has continued to attract visitors from all over the world since it opened in September 2018.

The birthplace of Lemmings and Grand Theft Auto computer games, Dundee now leads the world in innovative design, technology and medicine. Dundee’s harbour, once a berth for whaling ships, is now home to Royal Research Ship Discovery, famous for her journeys of Antarctic exploration under the tenacious leadership of Captain Robert Falcon Scott.

Through a lens

Photographer Patrick James Dilley was born in Dundee in 1969 and left the city in March 1989 for the bright lights of London, at a time when unemployment in Dundee was at an all-time high. He returned to his hometown in 2003 but left again in 2018 to settle in Perth & Kinross. In 2016, he set out to capture images of historic buildings in Dundee before they disappeared completely.

This image of the old Victoria Works, with its textures, colours, depth and light, is a fine example of abstract expressionism. Though better known for his portrayal of our beloved canine companions, Dilley is a master at capturing the everyday, and sees beauty where the rest of us see ruin.