The Face of Appalachia

Book excerpt: The Face of Appalachia: Portraits from the Mountain Farm is the culmination of over twenty years of work by acclaimed photographer Tim Barnwell. Combining beautiful landscapes with tender portraits, his remarkable black-and-white images provide a stunning record of a vanishing way of life on the remote mountain farms of rural Appalachia. Over one hundred photographs, printed here in elegant duotone reproductions, are combined with conversations with the subjects, to give us an insight into the daily lives, activities, and dreams of the hard working, proud, and resourceful men and women of this unique area of our country. Transcending their geographical origins, these photographs give us a look at how our forefathers lived, for generations, with seemingly little change, in the decades before modern industry, roads, and technology transformed the country from an agrarian to an industrial economy and then to the information age we live in today. The rugged and remote mountains of the southern Appalachian region have served to isolate and preserve the last vestiges of life as it once was throughout rural America. By documenting this disappearing way of life, Mr. Barnwell has captured the essence, beauty, and rugged character of the rural landscape and its people, for this and future generations.