Heirloom cabbage and mixed media
Size variable, 2008

Windows Brooklyn, 0.00156 Acre Gallery, Brooklyn, New York, 2008

Artist Statement

Though challenging to envision given todays hyper-urbanized landscape, Brooklyn, not so terribly long ago, was once farmland.  According to Of Cabbages and Kings County, a historical account of rural Brooklyn, folks who worked the land in the 19th century were mainly descendants of the original Dutch settlers.  Using slave labor and urban waste as fertilizer, they became one of the leading producers of vegetables (mainly potatoes and cabbage)  in the nation. The process of de-agriculturalization through suburbanization and finally urbanization, involved lucrative real estate development,  less committed and knowledgable heirs, high cost of labor, and an encroaching modern, and sophisticated  population with little respect and tolerance for the sights and smells and noise of the farm.

During Windows Brooklyn 0.00156 acres of Brooklyn was turned back into “farm land” with an installation of heirloom cabbage plants.