Looking at the way the farming industry surrounds us, from shaping our landscapes to filling our fridge, Laurence explores the relationship we bear with our food and with the animal world.
During her first visit at the farm in October 2014, Laurence met the Griffin family and the cows. She spent time collecting stories from family members, bonding with the herd and following the cycle of the daily farm routine.
The work:
Most of us are totally removed from the process of killing animals. Once hunter-gatherers, humans have separated themselves from the source of their food, now widely available as a pre-packaged supermarket product.
Laurence came to the farm as a vegetarian willing to reflect.
Rebecca Solnit invites us to reflect in her book “Wanderlust”,
“ We are all resurrected in a way by food, everyday; we live off life, plant or animal. And one of the unmentionable facts of everyday life is that we‘re all made of meat.
Guided by a childlike curiosity, Laurence explores the notion of life and death in the farming context, asking:
What is revealed? What is hidden? What do we know, what don’t we want to know?
Using a playful combination of pinhole images, basic animations, audio materials and animal skins, she presents new narratives where the edges between human and animals are blurred. In order to gain a deeper empathy with the animals, Laurence painstakingly hand-treated the skins of 3 calves from the farm.
The work invites the visitor to become an animal and view the world from the other side.
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