Photographic America

Three Photography Projects of America

60 Across America

Photograph the land, people, and places along route 60 from Virginia Beach to California via Route 60.

A Rephotographic Survey of Timothy O’Sullivans work 150 years later

Visit the photographic locations and recreate them today. Using the same type camera as he did, and also digitally with a 360 degree camera.

Route 50
The Loneliest Highway

Photograph America’s loneliest highway from California to New Jersey.

Thank You To Our Sponsors!

Thank you to everyone for helping make this happen.

Corporate/Business Sponsors

Private

Lindsey, Allen Family, Ohio

Phyfer, Jay, Massachusetts. Thank you for the book!

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Who is George?

I am. In my 50s. Dad of two adult kids and a spoiled Weimaraner. BA degree in photography from Virginia Intermont. Photographer and studio owner for decades. Love large format camera and alternative processes. Which means I like spending days in a darkroom with an enlarger. Also a commercial beekeeper, food manufacturer of honey products, and fan on many things.

Why a 7,000 mile trip?

As a child growing up in Wyoming my family spent a lot of time traveling with a pop-up camper in two. I have been to every state except Alaska.

As a fine art photographer, historian, and traveler, my goal has been to photograph Timothy O’Suliivan’s work and travel the US documenting it as I see it today.

What will the donations be used for?

While I have most of the photography equipment, a few items will need to be purchased. Film and chemicals for processing 4×5 sheets of film. A better computer for processing digital images while on the road. A used camper van that can survive the journey. Food and living money.

Timothy O’Sullivan

From Wikipedia- From 1867 to 1869, he was the official photographer on the United States Geological Exploration of the Fortieth Parallel under Clarence King. The expedition began at Virginia City, Nevada, where he photographed the mines, and worked eastward. In so doing, he became one of the pioneers in the field of geophotography.^[9] In contrast to the Asian and Eastern landscape fronts, the subject matter he focused on was a new concept. It involved taking pictures of nature as an untamed, pre-industrialized land without the use of landscape painting conventions. O’Sullivan combined science and art, making exact records of extraordinary beauty.

In 1870 he joined a survey team in Panama to survey for a canal across the isthmus. From 1871 to 1874 he returned to the southwestern United States to join Lt. George M. Wheeler in his survey west of the 100th meridian. His job was to photograph the West to attract settlers. O’Sullivan’s pictures were among the first to record the prehistoric ruins, Navajo weavers, and pueblo villages of the Southwest.^[10] He faced starvation on the Colorado River when some of the expedition’s boats capsized; few of the 300 negatives he took survived the trip back East.^{[citation needed]} He spent the last years of his short life in Washington, D.C., as official photographer for the U.S. Geological Survey and the Treasury Department.