Peasants seated among harvest sheaves in a field

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Seated among stacked sheaves in an open field, these figures are the working people of the harvest rather than a staged holiday scene. The gallery files it under Thanksgiving, a connection that rests on the autumn setting and the tradition of giving thanks for a year's crop. Rural photographs like this one, made before mechanical binders and combines took over much of the labor, record how the grain was cut, bound and stood upright to dry before threshing. Such pictures were often produced by photographers or painters looking for images of rustic life, so the poses may be arranged as much as observed.

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