I imagine farmers – the practical lot they are – don’t spend much time with the notion that their work is also art. Yankee farmers in particular are an understated group and would scoff at the idea that they are artists, and their work installations. But it’s not a stretch to consider the efforts here in that way. Sure the palette is muted and the design not particularly original, but a design it surely is, and perhaps just this season’s nod to the old adage that “there is nothing new under the sun”.
“Many of the farmers I’ve known and worked with actually do take the time to see the art before them. I still remember vividly the red deck of the mower after cutting a field that contained buttercup in bright yellow bloom. An old farmer I knew in Michigan taught me to listen to the sound of corn seed sprouting out of the soil. Farmers live so close to the land day and night they often can’t help but see the beauty right in front of them. Enjoying your photography. Sorry I’ll miss the show at the Bryan Gallery in October but wish you all the best.“
This breed is surprisingly docile around humans; they seemed more curious about my presence than fearful or aggressive (though they certainly had a pecking order amongst themselves).
Lighthearted, joyous, and usually found growing every which way in small patches, what’s not to love about ferns? They certainly have a special place in my heart. I remember once – a brilliant midsummer day on a small island off the coast of Maine – standing in the midst of a huge field of them, all rugged and leathery from the wind and salt air, but a beautiful hue of green nonetheless. Somewhere in my slide collection, there’s a 360 panorama of that scene waiting to be released into the world.
I had a girlfriend once who went on to a lifetime with flowers and plants, and seems to have developed a keen awareness of their secret lives along the way. She and I never had a conversation about ferns, or even flowers; we were young and barely formed, and a romance that bloomed so sweetly in the dead of winter, was gone by the time the fiddleheads appeared in the spring. And so it goes; decades later, I wonder what she knows about ferns.
The lambs on the Binder Farm on Rt 153 showed up a bit late this year – I think they’re about 6 weeks here. And what a crowd they drew in the 10 minutes I was there ! Kids and their moms, older women snapping photos, and most amusingly, a car full of adolescent girls off to some formal occasion.
