2,500 km by tractor across the Belgian countryside

“I wanted to know: what lives in the countryside? You see that the contrast between city and countryside is often magnified in a caricatured way: rural people who believe that in the city everyone rides a cargo bike and is woke, city dwellers who believe that all farmers are destroying nature with their shit and fat jeeps, or that it is one big romantic idyll of peace and space and being one with nature. I wanted to investigate myself: what are people in the countryside doing? How do they live? How do they see the future?”

Ghent journalist and photographer Jelle Vermeersch (43) traveled for more than eighty days and 2,500 kilometers with an old Massey Ferguson tractor and a cattle truck converted into a photo studio across the Belgian countryside. He slept in a dome tent, in a stable among the cows, and in the winter in a B&B or in a guest room in a drafty attic in people’s homes. “That tractor immediately provided food for discussion. ‘How long have you been on the road?’, ‘How fast does that thing go?’ – people were curious, I had immediate contact everywhere.”

The tractor also gave Vermeersch the opportunity to travel around “at the pace of the region.” By using the cattle truck as a studio, he was able to take people out of their environment and the recurring decor – the changing light: white in the summer, gray in the autumn, black in the winter – created lines in all the different portraits.

“Many said that they appreciate the silence and space outside the city. But it’s not romantic.”

“I grew up in a village in the countryside, not far from the coast. My parents still live there, my brother. I really like coming there. Just walking around in a stable, that smell, the sound and the warmth of the animals – that makes me happy.”

Majorettes in Keiem, the birthplace of photographer Jelle Vermeersch. Leader Kelly Steen has been teaching young majorettes for more than twenty years and was elected ‘Krak van Diksmuide’ in 2021 for her years of dedication.

Vermeersch photographed the landscapes, the plants, the animals, but especially the people, a colorful procession of farmers, pastors, café owners, former miners, refugees, hairdressers, the unemployed, an F-16 pilot. He interviewed about a hundred people who posed for him. “Many said that they appreciate the silence and space outside the city. But it’s not romantic. Just imagine: in the Ardennes, in winter, that really is the wilderness. Many facilities have disappeared in the countryside: public transport, ATMs, pharmacies. I also saw a lot of poverty; teenage pregnancies, young people without ambition who prefer to be chômeur [werkloze] become. And that is a hundred kilometers from Ghent.”

“Just walking around in a stable, that smell, the sound and the warmth of the animals – that makes me happy.”

What struck him most? “How differently people deal with change. Farmers need to adapt their practices. Some people suffer from that. Others start growing organically and take on some tourism. That resilience, it struck me.”

Saskia Ketelaar (1965), Hoek. She started as a pastor for the United Protestant Church in Belgium in 1993 and was a pastor in Aalst, Geraardsbergen and Lede. Since 2019 she has been a pastor in Hoek, Netherlands.

Patrick Lassence (1960), Freux. Chairman of the hunting horn association Royal Forêt Saint-Hubert, also a hunting horn blower. “They should not destroy hunting. It is of vital importance. We don’t shoot everything that moves, but we respect nature.”

Young musician who is part of the majorette team in Keiem, the birthplace of photographer Jelle Vermeersch.

Mathieu Pauly (1960), Heukelom, Limburg. Pauly is the owner of a large company (56 hectares) with strawberries and pears. Of his children, only his youngest son would like to continue working in the company.