These last few months, my friend Bruce Hucko and I have had the opportunity to work with eight talented young friends whose individual interests have been revealed through their collective pursuit of photography and aural history. As Bruce and I have shared our knowledge of photography and field recording, of seeing and listening, of our enthusiasm for the hunt (for indeed we are fundamentally still hunter/gatherers), our young friends have reciprocated by leading us to the heartlands of their respective communities of culture, their communities of practice. The visual and aural expressions of their insights have resulted in "A Portrait of Elko County" that is profound and complex, and captures a moment in time when the wisdom of traditional values is challenged by a quest for meaning within a larger milieu that is dominated by forces and factors that befuddle us all.

The Voices of Youth participants have produced a work of art of the best kind, a blend of sight and sound that cannot but evoke an intelligent response in the mind of the discerning beholder. To be part of this project is a great privilege. Voices of Youth shall remain a shining milestone in my repertoire of memories.

Jack Loeffler