Friday Eye Candy: Built Environments Expanded Beyond Wildest Dreams

Kriston Capps shares the work of photographer Marcus Lyon, whose "works imagine end-state capitalism, just before the whole thing shuffles over the brink."

Or, put another way, "Using digital technology, the artist pushes various developments out to their logical conclusion, as if to warn people about what we are building—and demonstrate that it's already too late to stop."

And to be more location specific: "Lyon's photos combine the macro compositions of Andreas Gursky with the digital technique of Jörg Sasse and the subject-matter expertise of a Brookings Institution panel. He's done an entire series on BRICs, the emerging economies of Brazil, Russia, India, and China. Lyon does not picture BRIC cities how they are today, but rather—through aerial photography and digital retouching—what they could become in 10 or 20 years."

Capps concludes by musing on the implications of the images, including his mixed feelings about what kinds of development inspire optimism and which have a more sinister color.