How have I never come across these before? Not only are they superb photographs of drivers caught on the go by Mr. Bush’s camera mounted on the side of his car, but the cars are all CCs too. These were shot between 1989 and 1997, but pretty much all the cars were all already vintage by that time.
But thanks to CC reader Earl O’Neil, who sent me the link to this collection from Mr. Bush’s 2008 book Drive (available for as little as $4.50 at Amazon), I’m now a big fan, having always been a bit of voyeur on the road, especially back in the day when people were more visible in their cars.
Man continuing east at 67 mph on Interstate 10 near Palms Boulevard in Los Angeles at 4:14 p.m. in February 1991
Some notes by Mr. Bush:
Driving is as much about going out into the world and going from point A to B and getting the thing you want as it is about circulating one’s image and being seen. Even though our car shelters us like a room, it seems it is the speed we choose to drive and the direction we chose to go that really determine the space we own and the privacy we associate with driving. I was interested in moving at the same speed as the driver beside me as a way to look into their world, to show them motionless…
In cities like Los Angeles the urban environment is constructed around the car—we are in close proximity but mute to one another. Driving actually eliminates the possibility of public discourse and community—it is like walking around with headsets. Also, driving, speed, make it difficult to take in visual details. We might drive 30 miles on the freeway and reach our destination with only a few slivers of memory of who we passed or what we saw along the way. Maybe this is the result of habit as much as it is the need to drive safely and pay attention to what is ahead of us.
Man traveling southeast on U.S. Route 101 at approximately 71 mph somewhere around Camarillo, California, on a summer evening in 1994
Making photographs of people as they moved—as I was driving next to them, frequently at speeds of up to 75 mph—who were dangerously close, was every bit as much about portraiture and assigning narratives and identities to multiple anonymous encounters as it was about questioning the driving situation that structures our perceptions and ideas of privacy.
The act of making the photographs was a performance—as is everything done in public. Either before, during, or after the drivers were aware of being photographed. I used a flash which in the bright of day was perceived as no more than a glint of sun but was enough to “celebratize” the encounter. In many ways this was an attempt to connect to those with whom it seemed impossible to connect. There were silent negotiations or imposed agreements, or a chase—sometimes by me, sometimes by the other driver which didn’t always eliminate the possibility of a misunderstanding.
Woman taking her time rambling south at 63 mph on the Hollywood Freeway near the Vine Street exit in Los Angeles on a Saturday afternoon in 1991
Man driving northwest at 60 mph on U.S. Route 101 in the vicinity of Hollywood on a late Sunday afternoon in March 1991
Man proceeding southeast at 71 mph on Interstate 280 at Alpine Road, near Stanford University, at 3:21 p.m. on January 21, 1992
Man heading north at 66 mph on the Harbor Freeway in Los Angeles on an afternoon in 1989
Man drifting northwest at approximately 68 mph on U.S. Route 101 somewhere near Camarillo, California, one evening in 1989
Woman gliding southeast at 64 mph on U.S. Route 101 near Santa Barbara at 4:39 p.m. sometime in March 1990
Man (possibly someone in character) traveling northwest at 60 mph on U.S. Route 101 in the vicinity of Hollywood on a late Sunday afternoon in March 1991
Man drifting near the shoulder at 61 mph on Interstate 405 around the Getty Drive exit at 4:01 p.m. on a Tuesday in September 1992
Man traveling north at 64 mph on the Glendale Freeway near Verdugo Road, Los Angeles, at 3:13 p.m. on Thursday, February 20, 1997
Man going northeast at 71 mph on Interstate 40 outside of Phoenix on a Monday morning in January 1991
Man rolling along (and whistling audibly) on U.S. Route 101 at approximately 55 mph on a summer day in 1989
SomeoneÕs son traveling northbound at 60 mph on U.S. Route 101 near Santa Barbara at 1:55 p.m. in August 1993
Woman rolling to a stoplight at Wilshire Boulevard and Lafayette Park Place in Hollywood at 2:38Ð2:39 p.m. on January 18, 1997
Woman going about her business at 62 mph on southbound Interstate 5 near San Diego at 9:38 a.m. on a Tuesday in February 1992
Men heading south on Interstate 5 in San Joaquin Valley, California (no other information available)
Couple (and children) going northwest at 37 mph on West Grand Avenue in Sun City, Arizona, on a Friday evening in January 1992
Women racing southwest at 41 mph along 26th Street near the Riviera Country Club, Pacific Palisades, California, at 1:14 p.m. on a Tuesday in February 1997
Man possibly returning from college at 71 mph along the Camino Real near San Juan Road at 3:33 p.m. on a Saturday in June 1993
Man driving (with woman reading and parakeet clinging) southbound at 72 mph on Interstate 5 near Wheeler Ridge Road outside of Bakersfield, California, at 3:37 p.m. on a weekday in July 1992
Man cruising south-southeast at 74 mph on Interstate 5 somewhere between San Francisco and Los Angeles on a summer day in 1993
Person traveling northbound at 71 mph on U.S. Route 101 at approximately 5:20 p.m. on a Thursday in February 1997
High school students facing north at 0 mph on Sepulveda Boulevard in Westwood, California, at 3:01 p.m. on a Saturday in February 1997
Man moving southbound between 58 and 67 mph in the slow lane on Interstate 5 near the Fletcher Avenue exit at 2:40 p.m. on a Thursday in 1991
Man heading south at 73 mph on Interstate 5 near Buttonwillow Drive outside of Bakersfield, California, at 5:36 p.m. on a Tuesday in March 1992
Man finding his way south at 64 mph on Interstate 5 near Wildcat Canyon, California, on a Sunday in 1993
Person driving somewhere in the last decade of the previous millennium (whereabouts unknown)
Woman waiting to proceed south at Sunset and Highland boulevards, Los Angeles, at approximately 11:59 a.m. one day in February 1997
Woman guiding her automobile down Washington Boulevard in Culver City, California, at 44 mph at 4:11 p.m. on December 16, 1990
Man traveling 73 mph toward an overpass on a Tuesday morning outside of Portola Valley, California, on an afternoon in March 1992
Man about to cross a bridge in the San Francisco Bay Area at 61 mph at 2:14 p.m. on a winter day in the early part of 1992
Person traveling north at 62 mph near Sherman Oaks, California, on a Tuesday in 1990 (this may instead be Phoenix or St. Louis)
Woman heading west at 71 mph on Interstate 44 outside Rolla, Missouri, at 11:43 a.m. in January 1991
Mother trying to look after son at 31 mph on Rodeo Road in Los Angeles at 10:28 a.m. on a Tuesday in February 1997
Woman heading south-southeast at 67 mph on U.S. Route 101 near Westlake Village, California, at 4:10 p.m. on a Thursday in February 1997
Teenagers bopping through light traffic at 51 mph on the Ventura Freeway near Valley Circle Boulevard, Los Angeles, at 3:18 p.m. on March 16, 1997
Man driving west-southwest at 77 mph on Interstate 40 near Leupp, Arizona, at 1:20 p.m. on a Wednesday in the summer of 1989
Man traveling southeast at approximately 68 mph on U.S. Route 101 someplace in southern California in the winter of 1997
Man keeping it moving at 81 mph (I am not sure where) on a Sunday in 1989
Woman driving south at 38 mph on La Cienaga Boulevard near the Beverly Center, Los Angeles, at 1:49 p.m. on a weekday in March 1997
Beverly Hills high school students (?) cruising west at 38 mph along Sunset Boulevard on a weekend in February 1997
Man heading west at 78 mph on Interstate 10 near Palm Springs, California, sometime during an evening in 1990
Man ramping down from the Santa Monica Freeway to the northbound Harbor Freeway at 31 mph at 12:18 a.m. on a Saturday morning in 1995
Man driving west at 23 mph down a yet-to-be-named dirt road, around lunchtime, during a construction boom in Las Vegas in June of 1989
Man traveling southbound at 67 mph on U.S. Route 101 near Montecito, California, at 6:31 p.m. on or around the 28th of a summer month on a Sunday in 1994
Man driving southwest at approximately 72 mph on Interstate 40 in Arizona on an afternoon of the July 4th weekend of 1989 (possibly with an air conditioner malfunction)
Wow – love them all.
That blonde vamp in the pink corvette is “Angelyne”. Remember reading about her in a car magazine in the 80s.
She was famous for driving around Beverly Hills / Hollywood in a pink Corvette C3 and for renting ad billboards displaying huge images of herself.
By being a self proclaimed “star” she somehow was the predecessor of today´s Kim Kardashian type of celebrity.
I was about to post, but you save me the trouble. I recognized Angelyne instantly.
Here she is, sans makeup in her Cadillac later the same day 🙂
just to be fair….here she is in her 80s heyday…
These are just beautiful and fascinating. Such a mundane idea executed so well. I think I need to get a copy of this book…
Those are fascinating shots. They make me pine for the days when old Mopars were easy pickings for not much money. They are well represented here.
The guy in the white Porsche 356 looks like Kurt Vonnegut Jr., but probably isn’t.
Incredible stuff! Just purchased my copy. Thanks, Paul.
I was going to opine that the person in the pink Corvette was not a female, but I guess I am wrong. I think I need this book too! I love “ruin porn” (shots inside & out of abandoned buildings in Detroit, etc.) and this is a derivative of that. Where are all these cars now, I wonder? Some look great, but some look incredibly weathered given their relative youth at the time the shots were made. The shot of the 1960 or so ponton Mercedes when it was 32 years old grabbed my attention. That’s like passing a 1986 S-Class today. You wouldn’t think much about it, most likely.
Actually, Angelyne is a woman, always was, but there is another version that was from the next decade, and looked very similar, but was born male. Amanda Lepore did a very similar schtick, but in New York via the Club Kid scene, and as far as one can tell, never drove a pink Corvette. Once could say that both were parodies of what the “ultimate Barbie” would be, but then there are the girls who have had surgeries to alter themselves to have a body by Mattel. One could posit the same applies to the different versions of Corvettes themselves, as they reinvent themselves every few years.
The man in the black sedan on route 101 looks like Richard Anderson, Lee Majors’ boss in the Six Million Dollar Man.
I was thinking the exact same thing!
Me too! He was also the bionic woman’s boss. Was there ever another character that was featured in two shows at the same time?
Yep, me too. Couldn’t remember his name, though.
I think it could be G. D. Spradlin, he played the corrupt senator in Godfather II.
Awesome shots, 51-55 mph is my sweet spot for air cooled VW travel.
And a guy reading a book, but nobody on their cell phones!!
nobody on their cell phones!!
Remember when they used to be called “car phones”? And having one meant you were a really important big shot? Although some models were so big and heavy they were more or less permanently installed in one’s car, it seems like even the fully portable ones were called that at the time. At least I seem to remember a really old episode of Frasier, probably from the first season, where Frasier’s briefcase was stolen, and he mentions that his “car phone” was in it.
I remember a portable “bag phone” that could be transported between vehicles. So high tech then. Now, uhm, not so much.
Fantastic, love the concept, each shot is like the first paragraph of a novel. Guy whistling while reading a book is priceless, man (possibly someone in character) looks like a Cindy Sherman photo
“Someone in character”… is that a Lagonda?
The family with the short pipe and the parakeet and the intensely reading woman… They’re always in character without even trying! Mr. and Mrs. Idi O. Syncrasy.
Based on the roof, I think that’s a Bentley S3 Continental Flying Spur or the corresponding Rolls.
My personal favorite is
“Woman driving south at 38 mph on La Cienaga Boulevard”
It soooo much represents a long lost american era.
So much fun to look at! Even more so as I could have been in almost any of those places on those dates.
The guy with the packed car smoking a pipe is priceless and remember those huge aluminum U-Haul roof-boxes? That on a Colt with a car full of stuff, I can’t imagine how sluggish it would feel, but still, it was doing 72mph on I-5…
I forgot who said it but it does seem to be true that if you drive around Southern California long enough, you’ll see one of every car ever made…
Could it be that the parakeet was always kept in that car, as an advanced warning against carbon monoxide poisoning? When he falls off his perch, you’d have 5 minutes to pull over and get some fresh air.
Great photos, but what surprised me is how many really beat up motor cars are on the roads in the USA, I don’t think you see that in Western Europe.
I’m surprised about the legality of this. Usually in a newspaper, pictures of individuals are published with their names. An exception would be a picture of say, Penn Station in NYC with a crowd of people.
I guess I’m wrong, but I just don’t get publishing pictures of individuals in their private cars is considered ok.
In the US, it’s generally okay to take a picture in a public place and publish it as news or art, even if it’s art for sale.
In America you can take pictures of whatever you want in public. Free press depends on this.
There are restrictions on usage, tho. It happens that news and art, even for profit, generally are permitted uses.
One- and two-hundred years from now, these pictures will be framed and displayed in houses and museums–just as people today have pictures of clipper ships and riders on horseback. And people centuries from now will say, “In what a quaint and romantic time those motorists of the late 20th century lived!”
Below: My high school history teacher, Mr. Shoemaker, trying out my 1962 Mercury Comet. Whippany, N.J., 1984.
Not a bad picture in the bunch. This was an amazing find and the stories those people and the cars could tell.
Plus a nice surprise – all these pictures in AZ, LA, and Nevada and one lone picture from Rolla, MO, a place I lived for three years!!!
I wonder if I am the only person that thinks this is all a waste of space and utter garbage, or maybe I am just the only one stupid enough to say so.
Maybe.
Well, the only one on this site. You know, the site dedicated to photography of old cars?
Cooking with Martha Stewart —> that way
Often times, “utter garbage” photography becomes better as it ages. Photos of the Civil War, shot on glass plate negatives were considered “utter garbage” in the aftermath of the war. Glass plates were a precious resource, too good to be discarded because they were tinged with images of the war. They were used in greenhouses. Countless images of “utter garbage” were lost to the suns rays.
Based upon her hairstyle, this woman may have been a fan of The Romantics (Talking in Your Sleep).
Nice collection of photographs and I enjoy reading the comments as well. The clothing, hair styles, and the cars are interesting to look back on. I sometimes wonder what persona I give off as I drive my 1993 Camry stick shift to and from work.
Pretty sure that was actor Richard Anderson (“Six Million Dollar Man” fame) in the black Bentley or Rolls.
As other’s have said, these are incredible shots. Very intersting to look at the cars and people some 20+ years ago. It was great to see these classics still being used for daily service.
Used to see Angelyne regularly when I lived on Hollywood Boulevard in the 80’s. And she’s still around, still driving a pink Corvette; have seen her a couple of times within the the past two years or so.
I feel as if I’ve just thumbed through 30 or so short stories. Or more accurately, chapters. What happens in the next bit, I wonder.
Imagine a present photo of a “man in grey 1998 Honda SUV heading south.” Who’d ever forsee a non-event in our lives as being of interest 20 years+ from now? Proof again good artists are mad and see what we don’t and are wholly necessary.
Story by a columnist here, (an old-school ex-WW2 soldier, racontuer, author and publisher), in his column in the local broadsheet (The Age) 20 years ago about driving his ancient ute along a country freeway, conducting forcefully to Beethoven’s Choral symphony as it it crackled on the radio from the one speaker, only to glance over at the fine new Euro-steed slowly going by him in the fast lane and for one second lock eyes with the driver there doing the exact same with the exact same piece. A flash in time.
Said columnist offered the unidentified gent a fine bottle of wine if he would contact the author to confirm the story, and perhaps even share the bottle with him.
Pre-internet, many months, perhaps a year, passed and the columnist published a little afterword to his Saturday piece to say that he had never received so many letters about any of his columns in his time, all with the same enquiry: and no, alas, he’d never been contacted by the driver.
A story to illustrate the need most of us have for human contact, and perhaps the longing to know that a story ended well.
Only 5 passengers in the VW Beetle picture.
We once got 7 crammed into my Beetle for a mid-town trip.;-)
It’s interesting how the scope of these great pictures let me almost always determine the make and model of the cars, but most leave a doubt about their model year. As an example, the Chevy II coupe is probably a 69, as it has headrests, small rear sidemarker, and “Nova” script absent on the rear fender.
I’ll get the book…great collection!
The man driving the burnt orange or brown colored 911 is the spitting image of my grandpa, facial features, hairline, sunglasses, and even his expression. I’m pretty sure he never had a Porsche, nor would have been in Southern California at the time, but how I wonder lol
That yellow Camaro made me double take as well, with yellow paint and centerlines I half expecteted to see a younger Freiburger behind the wheel…
Nice, I came across several copies of this book at a local Half Price Books last year. I paged through it for a few minutes but didn’t end up buying it because it was rather large and I didn’t have enough shelf space for it.