Randy Olson, Melissa Farlow Photography

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  • A woman in an office works under a poster of a distorted portrait of a blonde woman outside a conference room where a meeting is taking place.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176255.jpg
  • Lu  lives with his son and daughter-in-law and their baby in a small apartment.  Lu was sent to prison during the Cultural Revolution and tries to keep pace with today’s values but still has questions about his son’s world. The “little capitalists” that live with their Cultural Revolution parents often have conflicts of ideology. The older generation thinks in a more Confucian way—never rise above your teacher, never rise above your father, others’ needs are more important than your own.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176312.jpg
  • A family tending their taro fields, threatened by apple snails.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6842_964803.jpg
  • Young workers at a rising web company sponsoring the Olympic Games collect tchotchke or trinkets to decorate their computer screens, desks and cubicles.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176446.jpg
  • A worker's desk is stacked with tchotchkes, sodas, cell phone and plant in a  rising web company sponsoring the Olympic Games.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176445.jpg
  • A worker helping to prepare for a festival takes a break to sleep in a comfortable chair placed in the middle of a street in Shanghai.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176413.JPG
  • A worker helping to prepare for a festival takes a break to sleep in a comfortable chair placed in the middle of a street in Shanghai.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176413-1.jpg
  • A young girl lights a candle at an alter in her home at the beginning of Day of the Dead or Día de los Muertos. It is a Mexican fiesta celebrating life and death of loved ones.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187588.jpg
  • Russian parents with their two children.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7890_1386417.TIF
  • A couple talk and laugh at an outdoor restaurant at night.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MT5959_1376325.jpg
  • A couple talk and laugh at an outdoor restaurant at night.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MT5959_1376324.jpg
  • A couple enjoys a private moment at an outdoor restaurant.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MT5959_1376323.jpg
  • Walking in Lummus Park along Ocean Drive in South Beach.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MT5959_1376315.jpg
  • Waterfront Scotty's Landing offers alfresco dining with a local twist.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MT5959_1312335.jpg
  • A biker cruises tree lined Espanola Way in South Beach.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MT5959_1312316.jpg
  • A man on the porch gives a treat to his dog who performs a trick while a child and her grandmother sit in chairs on the lawn.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023695.jpg
  • Residents of a historic, rustic log cabin hooked up to the modern amenity of receiving satellite television. Moose antlers adorn the walls of the cabin in the short summer months in the North Slope of Alaska.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6659_705770.jpg
  • A stone bench in a wooded setting of trees in fall foliage in the Blue Ridge Mountains creates a quiet place for contemplation. Frederick Law Olmsted sited the Biltmore house and created a lagoon, woodlands, gardens that is considered a masterpiece and enjoyed by nearly one million visitors each year.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6560_968642.jpg
  • Flags and statuary decorate a colorful roadside altar in a desolate region of northern Chile. Shrines or  animitas are a common tradition of memorials that mark the site where someone died. People who are not related to the person who was killed can offer a prayer at the animita; in this way, animitas can take the roles of popular saints in the Catholic religion.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187656.jpg
  • A young girl lights a candle at an alter in her home at the beginning of Day of the Dead or Día de los Muertos. It is a Mexican fiesta celebrating life and death of loved ones.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187588.jpg
  • Aborigine grandmother with child in stroller, and man with body paint.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7112_972094.TIF
  • Young staff workers at their desks in cubicles with computers in a dot-com office.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176458.jpg
  • A woman holds a baby while walking through the door of an adjoining room in a Chinese apartment.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176297-1.jpg
  • A man on a computer and two women with a baby on a bed in an adjoining room in a Chinese apartment in Shenzhen.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176297.jpg
  • Young workers at their computers in an office.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176452.jpg
  • A Russian woman admires her newborn with her daughter.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7890_1386415.TIF
  • Mother with baby born at the Moscow Planning Center and Maternity Home.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7890_1386409.TIF
  • A couple at at a table visit with a friend and his dog.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MT5959_1376326.jpg
  • Kanoa family tending their taro fields, threatened by apple snails.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6842_956212.jpg
  • A woman floats in her swimming pool on the edge of a wetland.
    MELISSA FARLOW_06460_668282.jpg
  • In a serene setting, two wicker chairs invite visitors on the north porch of Mo ntgomery Place, a restored mansion that was built in 1805 and opened to the pub lic in 1988.
    MELISSA FARLOW_06189_3860.jpg
  • Man sits in front of alter in his home in Xoxocotlan for Day of the Dead. Dia de los Muertos is Mexico's most characteristic fiesta where it is believed that souls of the dead return to the earth.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187074.jpg
  • Two Adirondack chairs on a scenic overlook.
    RANDY OLSON_06168_501172.JPG
  • Caudill family members rest on the front porch and yard when they gather on weekends to work in the garden and maintain their homestead. <br />
<br />
It took several years and a lot of money and determination, but kin of the Caudill family fought to keep their family homestead on Mud River from being taken over by the St. Louis-based Arch Coal Company. Nearly swindled out of their homestead, they battled all the way to the West Virginia Supreme Court where they finally won their case.<br />
<br />
For 100 years, Miller’s wife and family owned the 75-acre tract that includes a farmhouse, built in 1920, several small barns and a garden. John Caudill, a coal miner who was blinded in a mining accident in the 1930s, and his wife, Lydia Caudill, raised 10 children in the home. <br />
<br />
Arch Coal wanted to tear down the family’s ancestral home because it stood in the way of the company’s plans to expand its 12,000-acre Hobet 21 mountaintop removal complex. Hobet 21 produced about 5.2 million tons of coal, making it among the largest surface mines in the state. Mines like Hobet yield one ton of coal for every 16 tons of terrain that is displaced.<br />
Under Hobet’s plans, statements from Arch submitted in court say that “ a valley fill and an impoundment pond would destroy the inundate the farmhouse and outbuilding and bury the immediate surrounding land under the valley fill.” A lower court agreed with the company, but in the end, the family won.<br />
The mining operations have expanded to surround the Caudill property.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_996228.jpg
  • A young woman sits on the floor while trying on clothes and jewelry for an accessory photo shoot.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176550.JPG
  • With food ready on the table, a woman sweeps the floor cleaning an apartment before dinner while her husband watches their young child.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176311.jpg
  • A woman pushes a shopping cart by a wall of televisions that are all tuned to a show featuring puppy dogs in a Sams Club. The company also opened the first Wal-Mart in Shenzhen, China.<br />
<br />
This is the city where Deng made his famous “to be rich is glorious” speech. The signs that hang overhead in this abundant store proudly announce, “Made in China.” <br />
<br />
In China 17 years ago, the best store was a government “Friendship Store” that displayed a photo of a female employee on the wall with a sign underneath, “Worst Employee of the Month.” The only way you could motivate workers at that time was to shame them. <br />
<br />
Interestingly, but perhaps not surprisingly, beauty in China is seen as utilitarian. Cosmetics for instance are a major business in China and women in the China Middle see this as an important part of their lifestyle. Wal-Mart aims for the Comfort Class consumer earning between $5,000 and $20,000 a year.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176310-4.jpg
  • A resident walks from the balcony inside an upscale house at the Mission Hills Golf Club's housing development.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176281.jpg
  • A fish tank separates patrons from the kitchen at a restaurant on East Nanjing Road, a busy shopping area in Shanghai.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176425.jpg
  • The Bluegrass Region is rich with lore and traditions like the lawn jockey, a small statue prominently positioned on every farm with a lantern or hitching ring in one outstretched hand. Local legend says it memorializes Jocko Graves, who stood guard over horses for George Washington and froze to death holding a lantern in his hand. He was known as the faithful guardsman.<br />
Modern day watchman and farm owner Dr. Smiser West walks out his office door toward the lawn jockey painted with the colors of Waterford Farm.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7017_720967-1.JPG
  • The Kumkapi neighborhood, primarily immigrant, in Istanbul.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7890_1386394.TIF
  • After a candle-lit bath in milk and honey, a couple is served champagne, then they snuggle down in a straw-filled bed. Luxury spas find unique ways to attract tourists.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024081.TIF
  • A respected older musician plays of fiddle and the music he learned from his own grandfather. In the small community of El Carmen, near Pisco, most locals trace their ancestry to African slaves, brought there generations ago to work in the Peru's cotton plantations. The brightly-colored red walls of his home are adorned with family pictures.
    MELISSA FARLOW_04526_1187500.jpg
  • Sandals are removed before entering tents.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7803_1260639.JPG
  • Maternity Ward at Mulago Hospital in Kampala.  Head of OB/GYN was taught by Jotham Musinguzi who became head of Population and Development Dept. for the government.  Jotham recently retired because he did not agree with the current president Yoweri Kaguta Museveni. Museveni has a military background and just wants to get BOOTS ON THE GROUND. Jotham said he wants to bump Uganda's population up to 60M before he even starts to worry about infrastructure for all these people. Uganda is about 30M now.  About half of Uganda's population is under 15 and life expectancy is about 50.  Population has doubled from 1990 to now.
    MM7890_20100324_00121.tif
  • Students in their dorm room work at their computers while a roommate hangs his laundry outside the window at Shanghai's Jiao Tong University.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176579.jpg
  • A child plays the piano while a woman instructs in the living room of an apartment.<br />
<br />
From Leslie Chang’s story that accompanied these photographs in National Geographic Magazine:<br />
<br />
By the time she was ten, Bella lived a life that was rich with possibility and as regimented as a drill sergeant’s. After school she did homework unsupervised until her parents got home. Then came dinner, bath, piano practice. Sometimes she was permitted television, but only the news. On Saturdays she took a private essay class followed by Math Olympics, and on Sundays a prep class for the middle-school entrance exam and piano lessons. The best moment of the week was Friday afternoon, when school let out early. Bella might take a deep breath and look around, like a man who discovers a glimpse of blue sky from the confines of the prison yard.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176575.JPG
  • A model sits waiting to try on clothes and jewelry for an accessory photo shoot.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176552.JPG
  • Shanghai Jiao Tong University students in their dorm room. Men share bunk beds in small rooms that are crowded with books, clothes, bicycles.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176530.jpg
  • Seated in a room full of cloth covered chairs,  the “farmer” capitalist millionaires in Huaxi Village, a model farm for the last 45 years meet annually. Even though they are the collective ideal of the capitalist model, they still dress in Mao-ish style outfits and make decisions for the 80 businesses in a socialist forum.<br />
<br />
These “model farmers” were capitalists before it was allowed in China. They started factories, but worked in them secretly (no windows). When government officials came around, all the workers ran out into the fields and pretended to be peasants. They became the first and most successful capitalist exploitation of the collective. Huaxi Village eventually went bankrupt.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176498.jpg
  • A server carries a tray full of glasses inside an upscale restaurant in Shanghai.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176425-2.jpg
  • Brightly lit signs and calligraphy surround a family sitting at a window table in a restaurant in Shanghai.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176425-1.jpg
  • A couple on a bench with a lake view in front of a replica of the Venus de Milo at Shanghai Jiao Tong University.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176402.JPG
  • A couple contemplates the menu while backlit through yellow curtains at a restaurant in Shanghai.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176349.jpg
  • A teenage schoolgirl adjusts her uniform at a desk with a computer. Her portrait hangs on the wall above her.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176343.jpg
  • Families shop at Sams Club. The company also opened the first Wal-Mart in Shenzhen, China.<br />
<br />
In China 17 years ago, the best store was a government “Friendship Store” that displayed a photo of a female employee on the wall with a sign underneath, “Worst Employee of the Month.” The only way you could motivate workers at that time was to shame them. <br />
<br />
This is the city where Deng made his famous “to be rich is glorious” speech. The signs that hang overhead in this abundant store proudly announce, “Made in China.” <br />
<br />
<br />
Interestingly, but perhaps not surprisingly, beauty in China is seen as utilitarian. Cosmetics for instance are a major business in China and women in the China Middle see this as an important part of their lifestyle. Wal-Mart aims for the Comfort Class consumer earning between $5,000 and $20,000 a year.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176310-2.jpg
  • Young people wearing orange t shirts at the counter of a Sams Club. The company also opened the first Wal-Mart in Shenzhen, China.<br />
<br />
This is the city where Deng made his famous “to be rich is glorious” speech. The signs that hang overhead in this abundant store proudly announce, “Made in China.” <br />
<br />
In China 17 years ago, the best store was a government “Friendship Store” that displayed a photo of a female employee on the wall with a sign underneath, “Worst Employee of the Month.” The only way you could motivate workers at that time was to shame them. <br />
<br />
Interestingly, but perhaps not surprisingly, beauty in China is seen as utilitarian. Cosmetics for instance are a major business in China and women in the China Middle see this as an important part of their lifestyle. Wal-Mart aims for the Comfort Class consumer earning between $5,000 and $20,000 a year.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176310-1.jpg
  • Uniformed restaurant workers carry baskets of food from the kitchen for diners. They pass under a canvas sheet that shows a restaurant with people eating.<br />
<br />
All over China, young architects design buildings that are just experiments: throw in a bit of classical modern, a little Prairie style, a few Roman columns. This restaurant feels like you are sitting inside the restaurant – inside the restaurant.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176304-1.jpg
  • Couples shop for furniture at the IKEA store in Shanghai, China that is packed daily, but particularly on Sundays. Consumers have become increasingly willing to purchase home decor as a means of improving their standard of living. Sometimes one can’t maneuver through the aisles.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176337.jpg
  • A servers watchful eye surveys the restaurant where a couple sits among fish tanks that decorate the room as well as  a television screen on the wall above them.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176319.jpg
  • A woman with a pink umbrella is surrounded by neon-colored advertisements in Sams Club. The company also opened the first Wal-Mart in Shenzhen, China.<br />
<br />
This is the city where Deng made his famous “to be rich is glorious” speech. The signs that hang overhead in this abundant store proudly announce, “Made in China.” <br />
<br />
In China 17 years ago, the best store was a government “Friendship Store” that displayed a photo of a female employee on the wall with a sign underneath, “Worst Employee of the Month.” The only way you could motivate workers at that time was to shame them. <br />
<br />
Interestingly, but perhaps not surprisingly, beauty in China is seen as utilitarian. Cosmetics for instance are a major business in China and women in the China Middle see this as an important part of their lifestyle. Wal-Mart aims for the Comfort Class consumer earning between $5,000 and $20,000 a year.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7493_1176310-3.jpg
  • Rapa Nui dancers perform on stage for a group of tourists. Dressed in native costumes, the music and dance group entertains engaging the audience to join them on stage.
    RANDY OLSON_MM8059_1493953.JPG
  • A Rapa Nui man with his Belgian girlfriend live in a one-room house that has electricity but no indoor plumbing. The ocean is close by and Polynesians had a knack for colonizing even the most inhospitable oceanic rock.
    RANDY OLSON_MM8059_1477350.JPG
  • A halter is placed on a thoroughbred foal soon after birth which help the babies adjust to handling by humans.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7017_720967-5.JPG
  • Keeneland Race track's Thoroughbred horse auction for two-year olds is where horses often sell for six figures. A bid spotter dressed in a tuxedo searches the crowd while a video showing the horse sprinting on the track along with the time is show on monitors above.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7017_720973-3.JPG
  • Chairs sit under an arbor in a field.
    RANDY OLSON_MM6689_702588_6.TIF
  • Street are lit at dusk outside a plush hotel in St. Moritz. Glitzy designer shops attract high-end tourists for a glamorous vacation in the Swiss Alps.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024076-3.TIF
  • A waiter prepares a dining room by freshening the floral arrangements in a plush hotel in the Swiss Alps. The elegant Badrutt's Palace opened in 1896, and over the years has welcomed tourists and celebrities like Alfred Hitchcock, Audrey Hepburn and Charlie Chaplin.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024076-2.TIF
  • Elderly La Scala musicians in a nursing home.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7890_1386354-2.TIF
  • Elderly La Scala musicians in a nursing home.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7890_1386354.TIF
  • A robot programmed to help elderly out of bed and into a wheelchair.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7890_1386430.TIF
  • Maternity ward at Mulago Hospital in Kampala.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7890_1386320-4.TIF
  • Maternity ward at Mulago Hospital in Kampala.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7890_1386320-2.TIF
  • Friends on the beach at Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MT5959_1376340.jpg
  • Stacks of plates are put out for morning breakfast.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MT5959_1376327.jpg
  • For an anniversary celebration, a husband surprised his wife with a romantic candle-lit dinner in a tent perched above a secluded beach on Prince of Wales Island.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1075169.jpg
  • A big congratulations wish to a couple dressed in formal attire who donned crampons to walk on ice to be married on the Mendenhall Glacier. They took a helicopter onto the icefield and said their vows, then were toasted husband and wife.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7258_1075164.jpg
  • A nun tunes her guitar while her sisters rehearse music in the cloistered Convent St. John in Val Mustair. A UNESCO World Heritage Site founded in the 8th century, it has been home to Christian Benedictine nuns since the 12th Century.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024094.jpg
  • Two Ladin women dress in traditional clothing that is often worn on Sundays and for ceremonial occasions linked to the ancient customs. Ladins in the small village in the Dolomites divided from other ethnic relatives to the far reaches of the mountains further away from German influences. The people living here speak Italian and German, but Ladin in their first language.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024084.jpg
  • A waiter unfolds linen table cloths as he prepares a dining room for the evening in a plush hotel in glitzy, St. Moritz. Badrutt's Palace hotel is an iconic, luxury destination known for amenities and fine service. Huge floral arrangements and framed oil paintings create a formal elegance for tourists.<br />
The ornate Palace hotel opened in 1896 and over the years has welcomed celebrities like Alfred Hitchcock, Audrey Hepburn and Charlie Chaplin.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7139_1024076.jpg
  • Dr. Smiser West waits for birth of a Thoroughbred foal on his Waterford Farm. April and May are foaling season and most are born between 10 p.m. and 4 a.m. under the cover of darkness.  A night watchman calls Dr. West who at age 94 still jumps out of bed and comes to the barn to wait for the blessed event of a baby that is born to run.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM7017_720967.jpg
  • Framed portraits are displayed on the family organ in the living room of the Caudill-Miller homestead.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_1023693.jpg
  • Lorene Caudill prepares for their move by taking down family photographs. She and her husband Therman endured eight years of coal dust and foundation-shaking dynamite blasts as Hobet 21, one of the largest surface mines in the state, inched slowly toward them. They put up apples from their last garden and packed their belongings after signing a letter of intent to sell their beloved home to a coal company.<br />
The Caudills, along with other family members, did achieve a small victory by preserving ownership of a nearby ancestral home but only after a long battle—all the way to the West Virginia Supreme Court—with the coal company.  No one lives there now but the extended family gathers on weekends to garden and for dinners at the house, which was completely surrounded by mining. Since then, the house was burned down by arsonists.<br />
<br />
The Caudill house, where they had planned on spending the rest of their lives, is a half-mile down the road from the old homestead. They are some of the last to leave the community. Therman Caudill, a retired schoolteacher said, “It took the coal company 125 years to run the Caudill family out of Mud River, but they finally did it.”
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6773_996259.jpg
  • Protective wrappers that once held drawings for America’s grandest landscapes remain in the vault at Fairsted, Olmsted’s home and studio in Brookline, Massachusetts. More than 140,000 plans are carefully preserved as they were found in his files at Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site.<br />
Olmsted (1822-1903) left a legacy of urban parks that changed America’s landscape. He is recognized as he founder of American landscape architecture and best known for his vision of Central Park as a respite for urban masses.
    MELISSA FARLOW_MM6560_956180.jpg
  • Graffiti carved in a wooden bench in Mendocino Headlands State Park.
    MELISSA FARLOW_06019_489199.jpg
  • Porch of the Bolduc House Museum with antique chairs and rakes.
    RANDY OLSON_T0261_86162.JPG
  • A family prays at sunset near the campfire at the contest compound.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7803_1260617.JPG
  • Men gather in the shade of a tent to socialize at a camel competition.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7803_1260596.JPG
  • Women wait in the Palace Hotel in Bangalore to view a display of jewelry made for a Bollywood movie.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7339_1223057.TIF
  • Red and yellow flags decorate a colorful gold jewelry store in Bangalore.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7339_1223033.JPG
  • In curlers, B&B manager Delta Craft looks out a window.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7140_751015.JPG
  • A Ladin funeral procession seen trough a lace curtained window in a small village of LaVal in the Alps where the people are isolated and speak German and Italian but also Ladin, their own ethnic language.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7139_1024126.TIF
  • A man, television, brooms, and tables outside a back doorway.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7112_763230.JPG
  • A man seen in rear view mirror and a store through rainy a windshield.
    RANDY OLSON_MM7112_763200.JPG
  • An elderly man in a courtyard.
    RANDY OLSON_06569_1071271.JPG
  • Rug workers using knives similar to Harappan artifacts.
    RANDY OLSON_06569_1071256.JPG
  • Outside a rug factory, workers stretch the rugs for drying.
    RANDY OLSON_06569_654975.JPG
  • Ghanaian standing in water as others relax in a canoe on shore.
    RANDY OLSON_04319_1203409.JPG
  • A doctor and a patient at a health clinic.
    RANDY OLSON_04319_1182053.JPG
  • The Twendy One robot project at Waseda University involves a robot being programmed to help elderly out of bed and into a wheelchair. Twendy One can also pick up a straw and put it into a drink for patients and the scientists hope eventually will be able to help around the kitchen and with shopping.  The hardware is very sophisticated with top of the line sensors everywhere including the very newest tactile sensors embedded in the palm and fingers of both hands, but the software to make all those sensors work in practical ways is lagging.  The hope is these robots will be a practical analytical solution to a burgeoning elderly class in Japan.
    MM7890_20100512_19265.tif
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