1.  Summer 2009 The Re-enchantment of Agriculture

Wormfarm Institute www.wormfarminstitute.org

Edible Ephemeral Art

Veggie Mosaic This public art project is a celebration of art and agriculture that will partner a mosaic artist and a chef at selected weekly farmers markets through the 8-week height of the growing season.

Through collaboration between the arts, humanities and farming we explore the rich culture of food and its glorious differences within Milwaukee neighborhoods. Through this culinary performance art project we celebrate the bounty of local farmers, and the cultures unique to communities through the mosaic designs as well as the food prepared with them.

Project Description: During the course of a market day featured artists will assemble a mosaic of cut up seasonal vegetables from the market into a work of art. Upon completion the mosaic will be paraded around the market while the chef prepares a wok or grill. It will then be ritually poured into the chef’s vessel much as Tibetan Buddhist monks pour a sand mandala on which they have worked for weeks, into the river. A meditation on impermanence visual art becomes culinary art and samples are given away.

This project grew out of a series of events over the past year involving farmers, artists, writers- both urban and rural within a larger project called The Re-enchantment of Agriculture. Initially in rural Sauk County discussions about agriculture eventually come back to cities. This is where the people are and as Wendell Berry said “How we eat determines in large part how the world is used”. No serious discussion about agriculture can take place without urban people. Milwaukee in particular is at the forefront of exciting opportunities along the land-food continuum and we wish to build on them with this interactive event that celebrates growing and sharing fresh nutritious food.

The gardens and farms in and around Milwaukee are seeing a renaissance. There are economic incentives for people to grow their own not only for family use but for sale. The national Buy Fresh Buy Local movement is growing with the support of such bestsellers as Michael Pollen’s In Defense of Food and Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal Vegetable Miracle. The recent passage of Buy Local Buy Wisconsin Legislation has put Local Food issues on the map.

There are many concerns about urban food deserts; energy crises and global warming all have an effect of our food systems. At the same time there is much to celebrate and by bringing together artists, chefs and farmers to celebrate the bounty that is produced in a summer in the city we create more bounty and more possibilities to reinvent systems that don’t currently serve the people. The mosaic is both the project and the symbol. Mosaic is a work of art comprised of thousands of parts- different colors and shapes brought together to form a beautiful whole (and tasty) work of art.
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2.  Hail to the Chief

Stalk Market Report
August 8, 2004

Miss Creasy, my high school literature teacher looms very large in my memory. I spent hours envisioning her makeover. Six feet tall, alabaster skin, raven hair, prominent nose – she was a striking woman. But the bouffant hairdo, Peter Pan collars and librarian glasses didn’t match the passions I knew burned within her. I reinvented her in the margins of my notebook as a cross between Morticia and Cher with a touch of Agnes Moorehead for gravitas. As we studied timeless literary themes, man versus nature was a big one. Exemplified by Moby Dick, the protagonist struggles valiantly and in vain to conquer Leviathan. That theme remains contemporary in our day-to-day lives.

In the nonfiction, but nonetheless surrealistic, world of the farm, resolutions are temporary, challenges constant, successes are few, defeats—are many. Supporting characters morph, subplots shift but at the heart? Jay is Ismael and the garden is the sea.

I don’t know if ‘born and bred’ farmers see it differently but Jay and I spent decades in cities and suburbs before our rural odyssey began. Weather affected us, but mainly as a wardrobe backdrop. Violent storms were romantic or exciting or, alternately banal provokers of leaky roofs and damp basements. It never occurred to us they could threaten our livelihood. Eleven years of living on the land still hasn’t cured me of entitlement-disease. The instinctive response when something goes wrong remains, “Who do I sue?”

Flea beetle damage and rotted peas have been unfortunate but hardly catastrophic. Last year, I was gently chastised by a new shareholder for apologizing for a meager drought-related harvest. In her view there was a box of fresh delicious produce that she enjoyed every week. I was still worried about what WASN’T there.

Though not quite Leviathan or Noah’s flood, Nature sent us the harshest blow we have experienced in our short farming history. “Golf ball-sized hail,” Jay told me on the phone. I was 5 miles away hosting a Lebanese cooking class. I saw clouds and a little rain. Jay went on in a voice I barely recognized, “The garden is devastated”.

My thoughts were first for him. Jay is the one who is in the garden every day 7 days a week for 8 months a year. Lately, I’m the half empty glass of the family, and despite his predisposition and gruff presentation, Jay’s had to become the optimist. His vocal quality brought out the mom in me,“It’s OK, you did your best, some things we have no control over”. But for him the garden was a whole lot more than a science fair project crushed on the school bus.

I asked if he collected hailstones to put in the freezer. “ No”, he muttered. Documentation was not on his mind. I asked him to check for some in a shady area that might not have melted, to satisfy my curiosity more than to serve as evidence.

The morning after, the disaster was mitigated somewhat. Bean plants beaten into the ground had picked themselves up a bit and the pepper plants stripped of many leaves were still alive. The severed branches of the huge tomato plants were irreparable and the squash may not recover, but as swiftly as nature tooketh away, vigor returned to thousands of green lives.

The storm came a couple days after the Reedikulus Puppet Parade that enjoyed perfect weather. Months were spent planning and weeks making close to 100 elaborate giant puppets. I imagined golf ball sized hail blasting the fragile papier mache. The day after such an event Mr. Cranky, Pinocchio, Penelope and all the other goofy puppets riddled with holes would unlikely recover.

So on some, ‘it could be worse’ level, I was secretly glad that the forces that we cannot control found the vegetables instead of the puppets - victims with some ability to regenerate. I wondered if Geppeto explained to Pinocchio the chief hazard of becoming a real live boy: to be alive is to be given a death sentence.

The consoling words we would whisper to the child who worked for a week on a silly puppet or the farmer who spent 5 months in the field before a devastating storm would be the same: “you did your best, there was nothing we could do”.

In the literary version the protagonist would learn a valuable lesson, grow stronger and live to fight another day.

Miss Creasy, in the margins of my current notebook smiles in her grave reflecting on a certain dreamy student in the back of the room who was paying attention afterall.
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