STORIES FROM THE ROAD: Sanatorio Durán
I’ve always been an explorer at heart, and I’m most happy when I can wander with a camera and find new spaces or places that are different to my day to day. I think that’s why I feel the most inspired when I’m travelling for prolonged periods of time. Stories from the Road is a way of capturing those moments and keeping them safe, and also a chance for me to put into words what the experiences meant to me. We’re starting off with an old but loved venture into the abandoned halls of a Tuberculosis Sanatorium that can be found in Cartago, Costa Rica.
Often considered to be one of the “most haunted” places in Costa Rica (although I’ve never seen a ghost there myself), Sanatoria Durán was opened by Dr Carlos Durán Cartín in 1918 with the hope he could treat his daughter who was suffering from the disease. Ultimately she died, but the hospital continued to function until the 60s run mostly by nuns. It also housed patients with mental illness who were later moved to more modern facilities, and the building was briefly used for other purposes. Ultimately, it closed in the 1970s after a volcanic eruption ruined part of the complex. It now stands as somewhat of a tourist destination, and you are free to roam the halls and admire the sun drenched corridors and rooms. The spot was chosen by Durán partially for it’s natural light and good weather, so for an abandoned building it always seems remarkably sunny.
I’ve been a couple of times to the building, once with my cousins as a teenager where I shot an initial series of images, and later as an adult to capture more. What intrigues me most about spaces is how we as humans interact with them, so seeing the remains of children’s handprints on the walls or the graffiti from recent teenagers visiting feels less haunted to me and more like a time capsule of so many lives lived. Every door is open, inviting you in, even to spaces full of overgrown trees and dark corners. It’s hard to feel haunted as the sun shines on your back, and the rich colours of a once beautiful building still echo ahead of you.
I often think of the love poured into the creation of this space, the idea that a father so desperately wanted to help his daughter and then so many others. The fact that now it exists as a place people go to experience the past, and often to scare themselves with stories of what could have been. I love spaces that evolve into new existences, so I tried to capture the merging of the old and the new as well as the eternal sunshine that shines through.
