City Seeds Urban Farm
CITY SEEDS URBAN FARM
Training: August 18 - October 20, 2009; St. Patrick Center and City Seeds Urban Farm;
Chinyere E. Oteh, Instructor
Exhibition SITE #1: PPRC Photography Project Gallery
November 17, 2009 - January 10, 2010
Exhibition SITE #2: McMurphy's Grill
December 15, 2009 - January 10, 2010
Website: www.gatewaygreening.org and www.stpatrickcenter.org
Before I began teaching this PPRC Photography Project I was intrigued by urban farming, but knew little about its impact in St. Louis, beyond the fact that a few local farms provided fresh produce at area farmers' markets. As a regular at Soulard Farmer's Market, and someone who has always been appalled by the lack of fresh produce and healthy food in low-income neighborhoods, I was thrilled to learn that produce harvested from the City Seeds Urban Farm is sold at North City Farmer's Market, among other locations. City Seeds Urban Farm is a program that pairs clients from St. Patrick Center, the largest provider of homeless services in Missouri, with horticulture training through Gateway Greening, Inc., a city-wide community gardening program. Its mission is to "to provide job training, therapeutic horticulture, and education for individuals dealing with chronic homelessness, substance abuse, mental illness, and criminal records; to increase production and distribution of locally grown fresh food; and to serve as a resource for community education, sustainable urban agriculture and food security."
My time with City Seeds Photography Project participants was split between introductory lessons in digital photography at St. Patrick Center and further training at the farm, which is located in downtown St. Louis on Pine at the I-64/40 on-ramp. Before even picking up their cameras, participants wrote autobiographical poems about growing up, their everyday experiences, and the contrast between "the self" the outside world perceives and "the self" only they know best. With a range of experience from "I don't know how to use a digital camera" to "I've been taking photos for a while" and "I can't wait to get started," we began our assignments. Participants learned about various types of cameras and different approaches to photography and looked at the portrait work of Dorothea Lange, Gordon Parks, and Fern Logan, to name a few. In our fifth week, we moved to City Seeds Urban Farm and participants had the freedom to photograph the crops, each other, and the surrounding city. With a simplistic beauty, LeRoy Johnson's photo "One Foot Man" captured the wonderful kelly green of clover as he stepped out with his waterproof boot. Anthony Manning's image "Harvest" captured a truly authentic portrait of Shawna Goben reminiscent of Lange's photographs of farmers during the Great Depression. As I got to know the City Seeds participants and saw the inner workings of the program that enriches their lives, my own life was made better by the opportunity to teach in a natural setting. It was a privilege to share the participants' perspectives through the images they created and their unequivocal and eloquent poetry. In a superficial world, where we often judge each other on appearances, participant Gerald Hooks' poem reminded me that we can all strive to live more harmoniously.
--Chinyere E. Oteh, Photography Project Instructor
Text by Participants:
Just Because
Just because I'm homeless
Doesn't mean I don't have anything
Doesn't mean I'm always asking for something
I am just as good as anybody else.
Just because I am homeless
Doesn't mean I'm not like you
Doesn't mean I'm a low-life
I am just an ordinary person like you
I am in good spirits
I accept everybody as they are
We are all equal
We live in this world together
--Gerald Hooks
PARTICIPANTS:
Kenneth Crossland
Mary Deardorff
Rebinder Flowers
Shawna Goben
Gerald Hooks
LeRoy Johnson
Anthony Manning
Brenda Mowry
Raymond Savage
COMMUNITY PARTNERS:
City Seeds Urban Farm
Gateway Greening Inc.
St. Patrick Center
McMurphy's Grill