Tornado Alley (PROG)

[StephanieVanbryce]

This image was taken in winter, when the rains were just beginning to stimulate the growth of new grass. The region was probably once forested, but several millennia of human occupation have stripped it bare, and today grazing sheep and people foraging for firewood keep the hills free of trees. Here and in the next picture we begin to see evidence of artistic concerns that become more obvious through the rest of The Afghan Folio and in later projects. Often, through a small, almost intimate, section of landscape with figures to establish the scale, one can feel a greater sense of space than with a sweeping panorama with no figures. One must catch small figures silhouetted and in poses from which their limbs and actions can be clearly discerned.


Smooth Hills

Surkh Kotal, Afghanistan, January 1975