Leading Away: The Rural Exodus of the American Great Plains
Across the American Great Plains, gravel roads and roadside mailboxes quietly shape the rural landscape—enduring markers of generations of European settlers who carved lives from the expanding frontier. Once symbols of connection, linking families, neighbors, and communities, they now often stand alone, signaling the steady movement of people away from small towns and farming regions.
Leading Away reflects on this transition through images of ordinary structures that carry deep emotional weight. We were both raised in small rural towns and later left in pursuit of education and opportunity, creating a lasting connection to these places shaped by affection, distance, and memory.
Gravel roads and mailboxes serve as the anchors of this project. Together, they form a visual language of transition—humble yet powerful. In rural life, each represents connection: a lifeline to the world beyond.
