Staff Writer- Amelia Dewberry
Visitors are invited to explore the intersections of art, food, and labor now until Dec. 19th at the Farm to Frame exhibit in the Hillstrom Museum of Art, Tuesday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Under the guidance of Assistant Professor of Art History & Arts Entrepreneurship Colleen Stockmann, students Nora Birkholz, Chloë Rossow, and Audrey Power Theisen co-curated the entire exhibit. The idea began simply as an exhibition about food, but throughout the creative process a new direction started to take shape.
“There were dozens of avenues we could have taken the show down, but it soon became evident in our research that the most important story there was to tell what that of invisible labor. Women, immigrants, and working-class people have always been central to every step of food production, yet their contributions are rarely seen,” Birkholz said.
The finalized exhibit “follows the process of getting food onto our tables and consequently, into our art; from farmers toiling to the tools used to harvest and eat, to food preparation, serving, and eating,” Power Theisen commented.
According to Power Theisen, the intensive curation process took several months, “starting with lots of careful research and planning, sorting through and selecting artworks, installing them, writing text to accompany the art, and adding other elements to create a cohesive narrative.” The group combed through objects in the Gustavus Archives, Hillstrom Collection, theater department, and even around the Twin Cities to select pieces to tell a complete and interdisciplinary narrative.
Power Theisen thinks “there’s truly something for everyone to enjoy: books from the library, specimens from the herbarium, props from the theater department, photos from the archives, and of course, art from our collection.”
The work wasn’t finished after the objects were selected. “After that came the hands-on work: rearranging walls, picking paint colors, painting, measuring, hanging artworks, cleaning objects, and writing all the wall texts and labels,” Birkholz said.
Farm to Frame was an entirely collaborative effort. “You can really tell that Farm to Frame came together through four different creative voices—three students and our professor, Colleen Stockmann. Each of us brought our own ideas and passions to the table (pun intended),” Birkholz expressed. They each focused on themes that interested them most and combined their research as they went.
Birkholz was “especially drawn to exploring the experiences of women and urban immigrants in the 20th century, and the cross-cultural importance of mealtime. That’s what inspired the reconstructed 1950s kitchen.”
She feels most passionately about the lithograph by Raphael Soyer titled Fornarina. “It portrays a bare-chested woman looking out at the viewer with a weary gaze. Her expression, paired with the title (Italian for “baker’s daughter”) speaks to the overlooked labor and quiet strength of working-class women in the early 20th century.”
She is moved by the complexity that “Soyer sought to expose economic injustice, yet his decision to portray this woman partially nude adds another layer of tension. It raises questions about exploitation within exploitation, and how women’s bodies have so often been viewed as objects of consumption rather than subjects of agency.”
“None of this would be possible without Dr. Stockmann’s guidance,” emphasized Power Theisen, “and I’m very grateful for their wisdom and leadership.”
The exhibit ultimately reflects both the diversity and universality of human experiences with food, as well as the invisible labor and processes that put food on people’s tables. Visitors are encouraged to stop by and check out the over one hundred objects filling all corners of the Hillstrom Museum of Art.