David Plowden: The American Barn

As an elemental part of America's landscape and history, barns evoke childhood memories for many of us and recollections of a simpler way of life. Regardless of their shape and size, their forms follow their functions. They are honest and beautiful. And they are rapidly vanishing. Across the land there are abandoned farms with barns falling down, being torn down, and only occasionally converted to other uses. As urban sprawl eats up the countryside and food-producing Goliaths put small farmers out of business, the need for old barns has diminished. For most of his life s a photographer, David Plowden has admired and photographed barns. As their disappearance has accelerated, he has made it hs mission to document these structures.