#69 / Salt Of The Earth

 

The picture above comes from an article published in the February 2021 issue of The Sun magazine. The article is titled, "Salt Of The Earth." I read the article shortly after writing my blog posting from yesterday, which referenced Leah Libresco Sargeant's article on "Dependence." To my mind, the two articles are related - though certainly not directly. The Sun has erected no paywall that might keep you from reading "Salt Of The Earth," and I recommend that you do so. All you have to do is click the link.

"Salt Of The Earth" (the article) is a sample of "Salt Of The Earth" (the book). Both book and article consist of a collection of photos and short captions that document the lives of very specific people from around the world. They are not famous. They are not rich. As the author, Ethan Hubbard, says: "there no bankers, no businessmen, no city dwellers, no suburbanites, and no one fashionable or affluent." 

Ethan Hubbard is an unusual person. You can click this link to learn a little bit about him. You can learn more than a little bit about the world in which we all live, together, by reading his article in The Sun. One sample is below - a sample of the article, which is a sample of the book. All Hubbard's portraits are quite wonderful: 

Anne Burke, Berlin, Vermont

My good friend Anne exuded confidence that the world was beneficent. Abundance surrounded her. And in the 1970s, when skeptics said the small family farm was destined to fail, she proved them wrong.

“Life will always be challenging you,” Anne told me. “The trick is to polish all the moments to make them shine. That’s both sides of the coin, not just the pretty and easy ones. Each moment, each day is precious and should never be wasted or cast aside.”

I made this portrait in her barn. A shaft of light crept through a crack in the wall and spread across her face.

 

Image Credits:

https://www.thesunmagazine.org/issues/542/salt-of-the-earth