"The Art Of The Personal Project" Michael Johnson's "Two-wheeled World"

Thank you A Photo Editor and Suzanne Sease for featuring Michael Johnson's personal project "Two-Wheeled World"

My project, “Two-Wheeled World,” serves several purposes–the first being, simply, my passion for the bicycle. There’s what it can do for us as individuals and for the environment. We ride for fun, for fitness, to get from here to there. We ride to free ourselves from the daily grind or to lift our social conscience. Sometimes we ride for no reason at all. We love how riding creates a cool breeze on a still morning and how, after a long day at work, hopping on a bike makes us feel like the day has only begun. We ride to make familiar places new again. We see things in a different way, experience our environment more positively. Riding a bicycle in a metropolitan environment is one of the greatest feelings of freedom one can have. It’s amazing even to be able to feel this free in a modern city.

Then there’s the community that makes two wheels their form of transportation. The second and main purpose of this series is to put real faces to those who choose the bicycle over other forms of transportation. I want viewers to take the term cyclist out of the equation and replace it with “people who ride bikes." My goal was to put people first so policymakers, motorists and everyone else recognize that these are your mothers, sisters, friends, and neighbors. They’re using this great tool—a bicycle—and deserve to be safe and respected like everyone else.

I’ve featured people who use their bicycle for work, school, travel, play, to race, or who just want to feel like a kid again. People who are activists, artists, messengers, and commuters. My intention is for the project to humanize cyclists and hopefully make dangerous drivers use more caution, as well as show how much better off society would be if it were a two-wheeled world.