Fremont Bridge in Seattle

With brush and knife I wanted to depict the energy of a summer day in the late 1920s on the Fremont Bridge in Seattle. 

 

The double leaf bascule bridge spans the Fremont Cut (a canal that connects the Puget Sound to Union Bay and Lake Washington) connecting the Queen Anne and Fremont neighborhoods in Seattle. Opening in June 1917 the Fremont Bridge was the first of four bascule bridges over the canal. It was the most trafficked bridge in the city until the Aurora Bridge opened in 1932. 

I love bringing life to scenes seemingly frozen in black and white. My view is, life wasn’t that much different even a hundred years ago. People worked, played, raised families and cherished weekends. There were parks, schools, cars, rain and sun. People raced to work and home. When I was in my twenties, people in their fifties and sixties spoke about the change that’s occurred in their lifetime. I never thought for example, about life before the interstate freeway system; a system that was desperately needed but tore down neighborhoods and split cities in half. I thought it was natural and made sense. Now I’m on the other side. I’ve seen things torn-down, re-built and neighborhoods becoming unrecognizable. I realize however, things are recognizable to the next generation. 

   

The Fremont Bridge still exists today, only now it’s cobalt blue and bright orange. The cars are different and the trolleys are gone but traffic still rolls on. Kind of like everything else.