Artist invites public to cookout
PRESQUE ISLE — Carol Ayoob grew up eating mostly rice, given her Lebanese upbringing, but she worked in potato fields on the Cassidy and McCrea farms in her hometown of Fort Fairfield from seventh grade until she was a junior in high school. The smell of dirt and the feel of chilled fingers linger in her memory, as does the sound of a basket of potatoes being dumped into a barrel and the MicMac and French languages spoken by families working near her “section.” Learning to pee in the woods and to bend the body over for hours at a time brought lessons of resiliency, as did choosing how to spend money — earned one barrel at a time!
Photo courtesy of Carol Ayoob
A DOWNTOWN COOKOUT will be held at Riverside Park, hosted by Carol Ayoob, as part of First Friday Art Walk festivities.
The roughly 5,000 farmers making a living wage during most of those years from 1970 to 1990 were not able to keep their small farms for their sons and daughters as the demand for production and expenses increased, while the living wage for farmers decreased. In 1970, roughly 5,000 farmers were making their living growing 153,000 acres of potatoes in Aroostook County. Over the next 25 years, the costs involved in growing potatoes increased by 400 percent, as prices received by farmers for those potatoes, adjusted for inflation, decreased by almost 18 percent ($1.98 in 1970 per 100 pounds and $6.43 in 1995 — equating to $1.64 in 1970 dollars). Increases in potato acreage in western (U.S.) states like Idaho, Washington and Colorado, as well as New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island, contributed to a loss of markets for Maine potatoes. Mechanization reduced the usage of harvest labor. By 1995 there were only 450 growers with 78,000 acres left.
But did the potato go away? “Hardly,” said Ayoob, who believes that there is a sense that we are still a farming region, but it has become more a quasi-invisible practice supported by the “big ag” industry.
“We do not see farming as richly woven into the fabric of community. Few small farms remain, which are mostly specialty operations — organic, seed or table-stock growers,” noted Ayoob.
Ayoob posits that “it is in our best interest to support our farms and farmers and reclaim the culture of agriculture.”
After studying Permaculture in her graduate program — a design for sustainable living which includes the values, visions and systems of management that are based on holistic understanding, as well — bio-ecological and psychosocial knowledge, Ayoob began thinking about the direction of her art practice in a new light. Her interests in social activism, ecology and collaboration came to the fore, with her history of working to “build community” through the arts. She is trying to understand the economics of farming as well.
“Artists often create experiments that challenge the status quo,” said Ayoob, who is in her third and final year in the Intermedia Graduate Program at the University of Maine (Orono), “and I am writing and creating around the question ‘How can art play a role in the interface between farming and community identity.’”
Her four “Potatogether” performances, which are scheduled as part of Presque Isle’s First Friday Art Walks, are engagements that offer nourishment, relationship and networking, through collaboration.
Ayoob recently took to the streets with her wheelbarrow, at the January First Friday Art Walk, and handed out potatoes in lunch-sized paper bags, with an invitation for people to meet at the next (February) First Friday Art Walk, at the Riverside Drive parking lot, where she will bake potatoes in a bon-fire. She considers this a collaborative street performance and invites the participation of the public and a variety of individuals and groups to help in the “process” — by bringing toppings for the baked potatoes (onions for frying, chives, cheese, chile, broccoli, bacon bits, sour cream, etc.) to the table.
Ayoob’s performance is a living reflection on the story of “Stone Soup,” where a stranger comes to town and sees its people so caught up in their own lives, hoarding their abundant skills and stores of food. He (she) sets up a cauldron over a fire and fills it with water, claiming that his (her) magic stone will make the best soup ever tasted, but it only needs some garnish! The townspeople begin to lend little bits of what they have to the simmering broth, and the soup becomes a glorious meal shared by all — the moral of the story is that by working together and everyone contributing just a little, a greater good is achieved.
An important collaborator in Ayoob’s upcoming piece is the Presque Isle Fire Department; they have given her permission and help in determining the best place to hold the event, and the Presque Isle code enforcement officer has given her the ‘go’ on her baking project. Alden and Kathy Swanson are donating wood, and the Mapleton Boy Scouts will be building a lean-to for warming up. Doyen Farms have donated potatoes, and many friends are putting the word out on social media. The event is scheduled for Feb. 3, from 5-9 p.m., at the Riverside Drive parking lots, somewhere near the Presque Isle District Courthouse, as other artists show their work about town during the art walk.
Ayoob will inform the public about her next “Potatogether” collaborative street performance at the bon-fire potato-bake, so come to the table and bring to the table — as you are able! For more information, e-mail questions, offerings and comments to carob17@hotmail.com, or call Ayoob at 768-5903.
Should extreme weather conditions arise, a snow date of March 2 — the next First Friday Art Walk — has been set.
