Art and Agriculture
Thursday, February 11
USA: 10am PT, 11am MT, 12pm CT, 1pm ET
EUROPE: Scotland/Ireland/England:18:00 GMT, Belgium/Germany/Spain: 19:00 UTC
In this Zoom Dialogue we will hear from special guest speakers Carlton and Brandi Turner who are co-directors of a placed based regenerative agricultural resource in Utica, Mississippi. We will also hear from three ecoartspace members who focus on agriculture in their arts practice including Chrissie Orr who will present her work with SeedBroadcast, and Wendy DesChene and Jeff Schmuki, a collaborative duo known as PlantBot Genetics Inc., who will speak to the corporatization and the lack of transparency in food production.
These artists are a great resource for our members who are interested and are doing similar work. Each presenter will have 10-15 minutes and following Q&A we will open it up to participants to engage in a round table format.
Special Guest Speakers:
Carlton Turner works across the country as a performing artist, arts advocate, policy shaper, lecturer, consultant, and facilitator. He and his wife
Brandi Turner, a creative consultant for arts organizations, are the co-directors of the Mississippi Center for Cultural Production (MCCP), also known as Sipp Culture. MCCP employs arts and agriculture to support rural community, cultural, and economic development in Turner's hometown of Utica, Mississippi, where they live with their three children. Their work weaves together research, development, local agricultural, with contemporary media & storytelling to promote the legacy and vision of Utica. It's a place-based program that promotes economic empowerment and self-sufficiency of low- and moderate-income people through education, technical assistance, training, and mentoring in agribusiness.
More here on Sipp Culture
Member Presenters:
Chrissie Orr was born in Scotland, a descendant of the Picts (the painted ones). She's an artist, animateur and creative investigator focused on developing “a relational aesthetic around community and sites with issues relevant to both.” Orr has created innovative, provocative community-based art projects in diverse areas of the world and is recognized internationally for her pioneering work. She will present her collaborative project co-founded with Jeanette Hart- Mann titled SeedBroadcast, which seeks to reinspire communities to keep local food and culture alive and vibrant through working together in creative ways. Orr will address the fact that in our modern-day big business world the cultural rooting of agriculture and reciprocal practices have been lost due to colonization and unsustainable growth. Orr is a recipient of the Santa Fe Mayors Award for Excellence in the Arts and is the co-founder of the Academy for the Love of Learning’s EL Otro Lado Project and the Institute for Living Story. She is presently the Academy’s Creative Practice Fellow. seedbroadcast.org
Wendy DesChene and Jeff Schmuki operate under the guise of PlantBot Genetics Inc., a parody of Big Agricultural Firms who skillfully manipulate current food production and distribution systems. PlantBot Genetics combines tactical media and public space to promote critical thinking and political action on environmental issues. By imitating actual corporate practice, we underscore the potential consequences of the global corporatization of agriculture, the natural environment, and public space. The Monsantra Project explores the lack of transparency and corporate “grafting” of food production and distribution by releasing humorous next-generation, robot-plant hybrids to prompt critical discussion on the environmental costs of intensive agricultural practices. PlantBot Genetics has exhibited at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh; the Pulitzer Foundation for Art in St Louis; and the Goethe Institute of Cairo, Egypt. Recent exhibitions include Biophilia at the /Eleanor D. Wilson Museum of Art at Hollins University, Roanoke, Virginia; New Ecology at the Lakkos Art Center, Heraklion, Greece; and Fresh Off the Farm, Field and Fork Farm at the University of Florida, Gainesville. monsantra.com
Images (top): Pop Up Cafe, 2018, Utica, Mississippi. Image by ©Griff Griffin;
©SeedBroadcast, Seed: Climate Change, Resilience; ©PlantBot Genetics Inc.
