A personal essay Revolution, process and propaganda
"As an activist, I focus on preserving and documenting local food biodiversity. It's a broad course of action, but specifically I focus on seed saving."
The exposition offers a summary of the artist’s whole career from his earliest works to today.
Ready or not, revolutions happen. For me and my work, the revolution came about in a phone call. While discussing the opportunity to do a series of sustainability workshops through the Stockton Center of Successful Aging at Stockton University in Pomona, New Jersey, a storytelling project presented itself. This project would collect historical stories from farmers or farming families about their agricultural legacy.
As an activist, I focus on preserving and documenting local food biodiversity. It's a broad course of action, but specifically I focus on seed saving. As noted in foodtank.com's Top Five reasons Why We Must Block Agrichemical and Seed Mega-Mergers, the concentrated seed and agriculture market could become more consolidated in 2017 if the proposed mergers of the six existing companies get approved. That will leave three companies with control over close to 61% of the commercial seed market according to the brief, Merge-Sandro: New Threat to Food Sovereignty by the ETC Group.
Seeds are now considered intellectual property subject to patents and copyrights making the centuries old tradition of seed saving and swapping a challenge. Seed saving was never subjected to any regulations or legal control. It contributed to food sovereignty and traditions to communities and cultures, and now, it's been commodified for a rigged market.
by
Jeff
Quattrone