Jim Richardson left the farm years ago, but his appreciation for farm life never left him.
A documentary photographer who has illustrated more than 20 essays in National Geographic magazine, he has traveled the world during his 35-year career capturing breathtaking images and continually finding ways to portray the rural experience that shaped him to the broader audience beyond it.
“I always wanted to depict rural and small town life in a way that would make it worthy of attention,” he explains over an afternoon cup of coffee, having recently returned from leading a photography workshop. “I recognized from an early age that good photography added validity to a place. One of the things I wanted to do for rural Kansas was bring attention to these places — not because I felt like they were better than other places, but because they all have value.”
Richardson grew up on a 200-acre dairy farm north of Belleville, Kan. After developing his photography skills working for student publications at Kansas State University, he went on to a 15-year newspaper career, first in Topeka, Kan., and later at The Denver Post. One of his first projects for National Geographic was documenting life in the town of Cuba, Kan., population 215, the hometown 15 miles south of where he grew up in Republic County. He started shooting pictures there in the mid-1970s in a quest to document small-town America before it vanished. That project is ongoing.
Writing about the town, he notes, “Long ago trim, freshly painted houses lined the streets. Farmers had money in their pockets and spent it in the town's stores. Two railroads brought trains to town, and on Saturday night the place was hopping. Even Lawrence Welk and his band came here. Today hardly anybody finds his way to Cuba. The trains are gone, many of the old houses are vacant, and farmers are scarce, victims of drought and low prices.”
At its peak more than a century ago 19,000 people populated the surrounding county. Now the number has dwindled to 5,000.
Richardson is interested in what he calls “rural viability” and the necessity of creating alternative models of sustainability and profitability in agriculture.
In a time when leaders question whether farmers are doing enough to tell their own story, Richardson’s multi-page spreads on small town life, the Kansas Flint Hills, the Ogallala Aquifer and the importance of soil resources have exposed thousands of readers to a deeper appreciation for life lived close to the earth. “With my work, I feel like I can contribute to an overall good cause,” he says.
Producing a crop of great photos
For National Geographic features, writers and photographers each work separately, but also as a team. Richardson’s job, he says, is to create “a visual narration in the best way possible” to go along with the written piece.
In “Our Good Earth,” featured on the cover of the September 2008 issue, Richardson made a series of portraits of farmers from around the world, each atop a trench dug into the land to reveal the layers of soil underneath. An exhibit of those portraits was held in September during the annual Prairie Festival at Salina’s Land Institute, best known for its unique efforts to promote perennial farming and ecology.
“It was interesting to see,” Richardson says now of the farmer portraits. “I think that provided some of the best visual impact for the story. You could see the difference that explains why it is that a women in Africa doesn’t grow as much, and it’s not just a matter of having modern seeds and machinery. Soil resources in different parts of the world are remarkably different.”
One similarity is the obvious love and pride each farmer has for the land under their feet.
“It’s not just a financial thing,” he adds.
Richardson wants family farms and small towns to succeed and not become what he calls “an industrial back-lot,” the proverbial ghost town on the prairie. One of his favorite projects was photographing the Flint Hills, a tall-grass prairie too rocky to be broken out for farming and thus a stronghold of traditional ranching culture. That piece, “Splendor in the Grass,” was published in April 2007.
Richardson’s not convinced the changes he’s seen over his lifetime have all been good for farmers. Despite the fact that many farm leaders have participated on trade trips to market their products around the world, he questions whether U.S. farmers and ranchers have done enough to understand the broader context of global farming traditions and how they fit within that landscape.
Eight years ago, he helped illustrate a piece on genetically modified organisms examining their connection with food safety. He remains skeptical about whether such technology provides a lasting solution to rural economic decline. “I don’t buy the party line,” he quips.
But he also wonders aloud whether farm life today is economically tougher than it was a generation ago. When he was growing up, he recalls that most farmers had jobs in town during the winter. “I question the idea of whether everybody was doing only that (farming),” he says.
It’s a small world
Richardson spends about half of every year on the road. After living in Denver for almost 20 years, he decided to move home to Kansas in 1997. He and his wife Kathy live in Lindsborg, a small town with a heavy Swedish influence south of Salina, Kan., where they operate two art galleries on Main Street. They opened their own Small World Gallery 12 years ago and two years ago added Studio Lindsborg to create more space to exhibit work by local artists.
Richardson’s ancestry is English rather than Swedish, and his favorite place to photograph is Scotland. But he’s at home in Lindsborg, with its heavy concentration of art galleries relative to its size and its liberal arts school, Bethany College, known for an exceptional music program. Due to the concentration of Swedish shops, handicrafts and festivals, local tourism flourishes.
The gallery houses Richardson’s prints, everything from 350 lines of cards to large framed wall hangings. It is decorated throughout with a large collection of unusual and antique cameras. Kathy Richardson’s jewelry is also on display, made from contemporary, vintage and antique beads collected around the world.
The Richardsons maintain a website at www.smallworldgallery.net, but prefer not to have an e-store. Instead, they want to draw as many customers as possible to central Kansas near this spot where Interstates 70 and 35 intersect. They also do business over the phone and ship prints and other items as necessary.
“People think moving to a small town makes for a slow life,” Richardson says as he juggles phone calls and welcomes the occasional visitor, all while getting ready to leave for his next appointment. He laughs. “That’s not true.”
|
|
|
Jim Richardson left the farm years ago, but his appreciation for farm life never left him.
A documentary photographer who has illustrated more than 20 essays in National Geographic magazine, he has traveled the world during his 35-year career capturing breathtaking images and continually finding ways to portray the rural experience that shaped him to the broader audience beyond it.
“I always wanted to depict rural and small town life in a way that would make it worthy of attention,” he explains over an afternoon cup of coffee, having recently returned from leading a photography workshop. “I recognized from an early age that good photography added validity to a place. One of the things I wanted to do for rural Kansas was bring attention to these places — not because I felt like they were better than other places, but because they all have value.”
Richardson grew up on a 200-acre dairy farm north of Belleville, Kan. After developing his photography skills working for student publications at Kansas State University, he went on to a 15-year newspaper career, first in Topeka, Kan., and later at The Denver Post. One of his first projects for National Geographic was documenting life in the town of Cuba, Kan., population 215, the hometown 15 miles south of where he grew up in Republic County. He started shooting pictures there in the mid-1970s in a quest to document small-town America before it vanished. That project is ongoing.
Writing about the town, he notes, “Long ago trim, freshly painted houses lined the streets. Farmers had money in their pockets and spent it in the town's stores. Two railroads brought trains to town, and on Saturday night the place was hopping. Even Lawrence Welk and his band came here. Today hardly anybody finds his way to Cuba. The trains are gone, many of the old houses are vacant, and farmers are scarce, victims of drought and low prices.”
At its peak more than a century ago 19,000 people populated the surrounding county. Now the number has dwindled to 5,000.
Richardson is interested in what he calls “rural viability” and the necessity of creating alternative models of sustainability and profitability in agriculture.
In a time when leaders question whether farmers are doing enough to tell their own story, Richardson’s multi-page spreads on small town life, the Kansas Flint Hills, the Ogallala Aquifer and the importance of soil resources have exposed thousands of readers to a deeper appreciation for life lived close to the earth. “With my work, I feel like I can contribute to an overall good cause,” he says.
Producing a crop of great photos
For National Geographic features, writers and photographers each work separately, but also as a team. Richardson’s job, he says, is to create “a visual narration in the best way possible” to go along with the written piece.
In “Our Good Earth,” featured on the cover of the September 2008 issue, Richardson made a series of portraits of farmers from around the world, each atop a trench dug into the land to reveal the layers of soil underneath. An exhibit of those portraits was held in September during the annual Prairie Festival at Salina’s Land Institute, best known for its unique efforts to promote perennial farming and ecology.
“It was interesting to see,” Richardson says now of the farmer portraits. “I think that provided some of the best visual impact for the story. You could see the difference that explains why it is that a women in Africa doesn’t grow as much, and it’s not just a matter of having modern seeds and machinery. Soil resources in different parts of the world are remarkably different.”
One similarity is the obvious love and pride each farmer has for the land under their feet.
“It’s not just a financial thing,” he adds.
Richardson wants family farms and small towns to succeed and not become what he calls “an industrial back-lot,” the proverbial ghost town on the prairie. One of his favorite projects was photographing the Flint Hills, a tall-grass prairie too rocky to be broken out for farming and thus a stronghold of traditional ranching culture. That piece, “Splendor in the Grass,” was published in April 2007.
Richardson’s not convinced the changes he’s seen over his lifetime have all been good for farmers. Despite the fact that many farm leaders have participated on trade trips to market their products around the world, he questions whether U.S. farmers and ranchers have done enough to understand the broader context of global farming traditions and how they fit within that landscape.
Eight years ago, he helped illustrate a piece on genetically modified organisms examining their connection with food safety. He remains skeptical about whether such technology provides a lasting solution to rural economic decline. “I don’t buy the party line,” he quips.
But he also wonders aloud whether farm life today is economically tougher than it was a generation ago. When he was growing up, he recalls that most farmers had jobs in town during the winter. “I question the idea of whether everybody was doing only that (farming),” he says.
It’s a small world
Richardson spends about half of every year on the road. After living in Denver for almost 20 years, he decided to move home to Kansas in 1997. He and his wife Kathy live in Lindsborg, a small town with a heavy Swedish influence south of Salina, Kan., where they operate two art galleries on Main Street. They opened their own Small World Gallery 12 years ago and two years ago added Studio Lindsborg to create more space to exhibit work by local artists.
Richardson’s ancestry is English rather than Swedish, and his favorite place to photograph is Scotland. But he’s at home in Lindsborg, with its heavy concentration of art galleries relative to its size and its liberal arts school, Bethany College, known for an exceptional music program. Due to the concentration of Swedish shops, handicrafts and festivals, local tourism flourishes.
The gallery houses Richardson’s prints, everything from 350 lines of cards to large framed wall hangings. It is decorated throughout with a large collection of unusual and antique cameras. Kathy Richardson’s jewelry is also on display, made from contemporary, vintage and antique beads collected around the world.
The Richardsons maintain a website at www.smallworldgallery.net, but prefer not to have an e-store. Instead, they want to draw as many customers as possible to central Kansas near this spot where Interstates 70 and 35 intersect. They also do business over the phone and ship prints and other items as necessary.
“People think moving to a small town makes for a slow life,” Richardson says as he juggles phone calls and welcomes the occasional visitor, all while getting ready to leave for his next appointment. He laughs. “That’s not true.”
