The Bike Shop from Wright Brothers: Then and Now series.
This one of the early photographs that Orville took of Wilbur working in one of their bike shops. The historic photograph was taken in 1897 so a few years before they were concentrating their efforts on flight. This is one of my images that was well thought out. I liked the historic photograph and I liked the quote from their nephew. All I had to do was take a photograph inside one of their bike shops and hope they work well together. I went to the bike shop in Dayton, Ohio which is part of the National Park. What I didn’t know is how well the two photographs would fit together. In the historic photograph Wilbur is working on a lathe. At the bike shop there was the actual lathe he had worked on in the old photograph. Many of the tool scattered on the work bench are the Wrights actual tools. I like the history of the old photograph with the history of the old tool in me photograph. I was able to include the floor from my recent photograph throughout the entire photograph, so it looks like Wilbur is standing on the current day wood floor. I like playing with time and space in these photographs.
The quote from nephew Milton Wright in 1904 from a newspaper interview. “History was being made in their bicycle shop and in their home but the making was so obscured by the common place I did not recognize it until many years later.
To see more photographs from this series go to clearyfineartphoto.com/wright-brother-fine-art-photographs/