As knowing the world would see them - selections from "The Young Farmer," photographs by August Sander

Young Farmers, circa 1925-27.

From the portfolio "The Young Farmer" from Sanders' "People of the Twentieth Century", in the collection of MoMA. One of the many things I find interesting about these images is how thoroughly they confound the expectations of how one might suppose an early twentieth-century "farmer" will be portrayed, both in dress and setting. None are pictured behind a plow, none in their shabby work clothes. Quite the contrary, almost all are dressed in their very best, posed in a dignified manner, displaying an elegant and artfully contrived ease. 

Young Farmer, circa 1911-14.

Rural Brother and Sister, circa 1925-30.

Country Lads from the Westerwald, 1912.

Young Farmer, circa 1912-13.

Hikers on the Hohenseelbachskopf, 1892.

Young Farmer, 1914.

Young Farmers, or Three Young Farmers on Their Way to a Dance, Westerwald, 1914.
(One of Sanders' best known images, apparently none of these three gentlemen were actually farmers. Two worked in a mine, and the third in the mine's office. )

Young Farmers on Sunday, 1926.

Young Farmers, 1926.