Abstraction: Efflorescence on a Concrete Wall

This caught my eye this morning, and I immediately envisioned it as something that might make a nice abstract image in a photograph.

Efflorescence on a concrete wall

I know what “efflorescence” is only because when I worked as a litigation paralegal many years ago, we had a case involving shoddy construction. The brick walls were covered with a crystallized white powdery substance, and I can’t remember now if the cause was poor quality (or incorrect) mortar or failure to include weep holes. But I do remember that term, “efflorescence,” because it was a phenomenon I’d noticed all my life, and I’ve always loved learning the “backstory” of things like that.

Apparently the term stuck with me, because even after 40 years, I knew what I was looking at this morning when I saw these fluffy, crystalline puffs on the wall 😀

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About Katherine Wikoff

I am a college professor (PhD in English, concentration rhetoric) at Milwaukee School of Engineering, where I teach film and media studies, political science, digital society, digital storytelling, writing for digital media, and communication. While fragments of my teaching and scholarship interests may quite naturally meander over to my blog, this space is intended to function as a creative outlet, not as part of my professional practice. Opinions are my own, etc.
This entry was posted in architecture, Photography and tagged , . Bookmark the permalink.

5 Responses to Abstraction: Efflorescence on a Concrete Wall

  1. Wyrd Smythe's avatar Wyrd Smythe says:

    It could make kind of a cool desktop background!

    Liked by 2 people

  2. mworfolk's avatar mworfolk says:

    That’s quite pretty, actually!

    Liked by 1 person

  3. mworfolk's avatar mworfolk says:

    True true, “ooze” and “pretty” are rarely used in the same sentence 😂

    Liked by 1 person

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