The enduring allure of steam trains: A nostalgic journey back in time
You can hear it before you see it.
The great hum of the steam engine pierces the stillness of the serene landscape, wheels screeching under the load of the grand locomotive.
When they were first introduced, steam engine trains opened up travel to new frontiers, and their romance and glamor still fascinates enthusiasts across the globe. Matthew Malkiewicz started taking photos of locomotives when he was a teenager, and was particularly enamored with the historical meaning they carried: "Trains built America, and a lot of people forget that. When I go to some of the remote locations where I take my photos, it reminds me of the great migration west," he says.
Malkiewicz, who is an electrical designer and takes photographs purely for pleasure, tries to give his images a timeless quality: "The viewer should look at my pictures and not know if it's 2014 or 1940. They shouldn't be able to date them, and that's something I always try to convey," he says.
Courtesy Matthew Malkiewicz
His interest in trains and photography stems from an early age, but Malkiewicz decided to dedicate himself seriously to his passion and create his website, Lost Tracks of Time, after a job posting took him to the rugged Rocky mountains of Colorado: "All around me there was this breathtaking, otherworldly scenery and then a steam train passes, it's as if you've lost track of time and have been transported to a bygone era when railroading was the primary form of transportation," Malkiewicz says.
Courtesy Matthew Malkiewicz
When he's hunting for the perfect photo, Malkiewicz rises early, trying to catch the famous "magic hour", a period shortly after sunrise or before sunset when the landscape is bathed in soft, golden glow. "When the sun is really low on the horizon you can clearly capture the mechanism of the locomotive which is on the outside," he says.
Courtesy Matthew Malkiewicz
The experience of being alone in nature is serene: "You're there among the most beautiful scenery around you, you're caught up in the landscape, these great machines pass by billowing smoke, it's surreal, you look at it and you think there's nothing there that says you're not here 100 years ago," the amateur photographer says.
Courtesy Matthew Malkiewicz
Malkiewicz's images invoke the atmosphere of oil canvases of great Romantic painters such as J. M. W. Turner's Rain, Steam, and Speed - The Great Western Railway, with the mighty machine enveloped in clouds of misty smoke.
Courtesy Matthew Malkiewicz
Most of the time Malkiewicz will study rail timetables to find out when to catch a steam engine passing by, but occasionally he will attend events where numerous photographers charter a historic train and take photos of it.
Courtesy Matthew Malkiewicz
For all their majesty and romance, Malkiewicz says that being a passenger aboard a steam engine train is a fairly messy experience: "The key word is dirty," he says, "there's a lot of smoke and soot, sometimes the engine spits out oil and it's a fairly wet environment. Even when you're inside one of the passenger cars, if someone opens the window you'll get dirty, so you definitely don't wear nice clothes for that," he adds.
Courtesy Matthew Malkiewicz
Weather conditions in remote places where he shoots are often adverse, but Malkiewicz considers that an effect which can sometimes enhance his photos: "It gives more atmosphere, it could be foggy, it could be rainy or snowy, I don't shy away from any of that, some of my best stuff has come in bad weather," he says.
Courtesy Matthew Malkiewicz
"Steam locomotives have a personality, when you stand next to one it's a living, breathing thing that is hissing and blowing water and makes all these different sounds that are unique to that particular locomotive," Malkiewicz says.
Courtesy Matthew Malkiewicz
At a time when the whirlwind pace of modern life threatens to sweep us away, Malkiewicz's nostalgic photos remind us that sometimes the beauty is in the journey, not the destination.
