Prairie Wheat

It is difficult to think of something that has a more powerful symbolic, cultural, and visual impact for Western Canadians than wheat. Much of humanity owes its development and success to wheat and its genetic antecedents. Wheat provides daily bread for most of humanity. People have moved across oceans to settle in places, like the Canadian Prairies, where wheat can be grown. For most of Manitoba’s history, wheat was king - and Brandon has a hockey team to prove it. While agriculture has certainly diversified over the years, wheat is still a major crop in most farmers’ rotations.

As a farmer’s son, wheat figured large in my childhood experience. I helped seed it, cut it, harvest it, shovel it in the bin, and truck it to the elevator. It was always our biggest crop and the size of the wheat harvest was, literally, my family’s income for the next year. If the wheat crop was good, harvesting a field was exciting and hopeful. If it wasn’t, every combine trip around the field became a reminder that cash would be tight in the coming year.

Photographically, I’m a student of wheat. I’ve always found photographing wheat to be challenging. Weather conditions, especially wind, conspire against a photographer looking to photograph wheat in the field. Context matters so much with a powerful visual like wheat, which often takes some luck or careful planning to achieve. Yet, I continue to try. Wind Wheat (below) was one of the first photographs that made me feel good as a photographer. On the other hand, yesterday afternoon’s effort produced more lessons than great photographs (Note to self: Turn off the multiple exposure setting when you’re finished with it!) This gallery is a collection of my efforts to photograph wheat. I hope you enjoy my photographs and thoughts about them.