State of the art #3

Earth's World (via Boing Boing) Growing up in New York City, my upbringing didn't include any county fairs. I'm not even completely sure what goes on at a county fair. Is it pie eating contests? Face painting booths? Horse rides perhaps? Because it's remained a mystery all these years, county fairs have also gained a kind of weird mystique for me. I think of them as quintessentially American. I imagine them full of communal goodwill and small town spirit and lots of miniature flags on display. You know, basically a Congressman's reelection ad where everyone is smiling and shaking hands with him. Leave it to Earth Oliver, of Earth's World, to disabuse me of those ideas. Oliver travels to county fairs and rodeos all over Oregon and documents the people there. Suffice it to say that no one in attendance looks like June Cleaver, with a set of pearls and a sky blue dress. But thank God for that. The people in her lens are so much more captivating and expressive. They're the real faces of America: fat and wrinkled and gorgeous and heavily made-up and strange and wondrous. They also immediately make me regret all my years of missing out on county fairs. Here is a small sample: