The Performing Art of The American Automobile

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The Performing Art of The American Automobile tells the tale of the very cars that marked America’s transition from a country of horses to one of horsepower. With this transition, Americans left the cities for vast open spaces which soon became towns and suburbs.

The first cars were little more than curiosities and play things of the wealthy and eccentric, but before long the automobile became the transportation of choice for millions and the backbone of the American economy.

Although many of the cars featured, such as the Ford Model T or Chevrolet Bel Air, were designed as highly-functional tools for transportation, photographer Michael Furman has treated them as works of art – and not just industrial art.

Against the back drop of Furman’s stunning photos, award-winning automotive historian Jonathan A. Stein chronicles the cars in the context of the social and economic conditions of their times. Which cars flourished, which faded away and which ones became legends? Through historical research, period maps, Peter Hearsey’s illustrations and the evocative photos of the cars featured in the Gateway Colorado Automobile Museum, Stein and Furman have documented the automobiles that put so many Americans on wheels and captured their imaginations.