Church by The Blonde

I must admit I was struggling with this topic, I mean churches are everywhere you look, sure... But finding one that was inspiring me to photograph it just wasn't happening! Then I went to a Vintage Car Show at an Open Air Museum in Buckinghamshire and as luck would have it they had an old tiny church there! Score! It was originally erected in 1886 at Henton in Oxfordshire, and is an example of the popular prefabricated buildings that served as churches or mission rooms at that time. Missionaries also took them all over the world as they were easy to put up and take down and transport. Manufactured by Boulton & Paul of Norwich, it is in timber-framed sections bolted together with an external cladding of corrugated iron. It contained fifty chairs arranged either side of a central aisle. There was a small altar table, two brass candlesticks, a lectern and a harmonium and was lit by two oil lamps suspended from the ceiling. It was very atmospheric both inside and outside, and I loved the colour of the red cladding against the blue sky (As you can see in the colour version in the film strip) But once the little girl led a huge cart horse into the scene, I just knew the shot had to be in sepia to give it that historical look. I made the church the centre of the scene, reminding the viewer that in those days Church very much was the centre of village life, and people are just coming out of the church gate in the shot as they would constantly have been doing in those days. I am also re reading The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain at the moment, and this photo does to me have an air of early Missionary America about it!