art + ag: Angie Provost
Artist farmers draw attention to some of some of the most urgent and pressing human and environmental issues. With art as a lens to their agricultural experience, we can learn to change the world. Our guest Angie Provost, put that lens to the racism and discrimination that still exists in the agriculture industry. While painting is a balm that helps Angie cope with the stress of losing their land and livelihood after decades of discriminatory practices, it’s also a canvas that enables her to speak the truth and to fight back.
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SHOW NOTES
Angie's landscape paintings speak directly to the land loss they've experienced as Black farmers. “Coteau Rd” (above) is a ghostly tribute to land that the Provost family farmed for 30 years before Angie says it was stolen out from under them by a white cane farmer. In the painting, the treeline drips metaphorical green tears down the canvas. “Although we no longer have the property, I still hold dear the idea of farming it," says Angie, "And the way to document it is not only what we’re going through legally, but through art and the visual expression of color.” - Debbie Weingarten
Angie Provost is an artist and sugarcane farmer from New Iberia, Louisiana. A former art teacher, Angie paints to express the painful history of her South Louisiana farming community, and the farmland loss suffered by her family after decades of discrimination.
Angie and her husband June are the owners of Provost Farm, LLC, a sugarcane farm and social venture business that was created as a means for the restoration and reparation of black/indigenous land ownership and farm operations. Provost Farm, LLC aims to connect the historical significance of civil rights to rural land loss in South Louisiana, and to cultivate a path toward food justice and equity.
https://www.facebook.com/cultivateequity
'It's not fair, not right': how America treats its black farmers - The Guardian, by Debbie Weingarten, photos by Audra Mulkern
What Happened to All the Black Farmers? | NBC Left Field
African Americans Have Lost Untold Acres of Land Over the Last Century - The Nation
What happened to America’s black farmers? - grist
Sugar Town Documentary - Discovery
Black Farmers in America by John Francis Ficara
National Black Growers Council
Queen Sugar - OWN Network
Sugar Cane Fields - courtesy of Angie Provost
Angie in happier days in her sugar cane - courtesy of Angie Provost
“The Provost house is filled with Angie’s paintings—bright colors, farm fields in neat rows, the blue of South Louisiana tributaries, portraits of strong Black Creole men and women. Angie is currently working on a watercolor series of her husband June, based on photographs she took when he farmed cane. “As June worked, he was connected to everything—the land, the machinery, the physical earth, the air, everything.”
"Air, Water, and Land"
Angie and June pictured with some of Angie’s figurative work.
Angie pictured with some of her figurative work.
PRODUCTION NOTES
Producer: Joe Mulkern
FFP Theme Song: Written and Performed by Joe Mulkern
Episode Music: California
Written By: Edward Hogston
Performed By: Finn's Fandango
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