Morning Market : stalls outside market

Photographer

Halpern, Joel M. (Joel Martin), 1929-

Date

• October 1969-November 1969

Summary

• Halpern photographed stalls in this same area during his 1957 stay in Laos. These are the kinds of stalls selling fresh produce; they tend to close by about noon. This is the border line between the market area proper with its roof and institutionalized fee structure and the outside with private umbrellas but all marketing done on the ground. Halpern says of this image, "In viewing these slides from forty or fifth year ago I now see all the questions I would have asked then. Then I had the energy in my late twenties, or at about forty, possibly to do the arduous task of photographing the market and even doing more than fragmentary interviews. But there was not time enough to study in detail market behavior and interview the elite, which was then my main task. Were there then or are there now detailed studies of urban markets? Maybe a reader of this caption will enlighten us."