Capturing baseball history

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Photography has followed the sport of baseball almost since its inception and continues to be a visual journal of the sport. Many fans of the game can close their eyes and think of specific photos that remind them of remarkable events taking place. Picture Lou Gehrig standing in front of the microphone, or Willie Mays’ back turned to catch a ball in the outfield.

It has also played a fundamental role in one of America’s favorite hobbies; sports card collecting. For Tony Dube, photographing vintage sports memorabilia has become more of a passion and his company, Collectographs: The Art of Collecting, stemmed from working on the 2010 book, ‘The T-206 Collection’. He recounts the author of the book, Tom Zappala, wanting him to work on the cover for the book; “We gathered up some vintage baseball gear from a local collector and some T-206 cards and made an interesting photo. It was great fun and everyone involved in the book project liked the image so much that they asked me to do more to help illustrate the various chapters as well as the back cover.”

Growing up in Maine he was always interested in photography, but it wasn’t until traveling the world while in the Air Force that his passion reignited. “After five years in the Air Force I decided to go to college at Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara, Ca.” Dube says. When he graduated, Dube decided to go back to the north east and locate his studio in Windsor, Connecticut. And being in the north east he says his choice of his favorite sports team was thrust upon him. “Growing up in Maine, you kinda have to be a Red Sox fan.”

His projects vary based on if it’s for a work assignment or for his art, but he admits the content is important. Dube says, “I have to find the subject matter and the people involved interesting. I have to enjoy the process.” So when he started working with vintage memorabilia he had to think about the pieces he was looking at and make sure that each item spoke to him. Dube says, “[I ask] myself what makes this piece special and unique? Why would someone want to collect this? The answers I came up with helped decide the composition and lighting direction I took. I enjoyed the process so much I kept borrowing more cool stuff and creating more and more images.”

Dube is currently working on a calendar for 2014 that will highlight his work along with the collectors whose collection the images were from. As a fan of anything vintage he says he’s also hoping to find some toy collectors to start a vintage toy project.

Even with the instant availability of images- photography will hold an important role in documentation and for artists like Tony Dube it’s important to continue capturing these memories that every fan can cherish.

Please visit White Point Imaging and Collectographs for more of his work.

He can also be seen on Twitter and Facebook.

All images are used with permission and ©2012 Tony Dube.

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