Plants, Pests and Romance

Emerging from layers of paint and wax are words torn from romance novels, images copied from their covers, and tracings of plants and insects from a 19th century Encyclopedia of Gardening.

This body of work has to do with farming practices and romance. Every romance novel deals with power issues between men and women.

Women were the first farmers. When people began to settle, men took over the farming and its increasingly heavy labor. This new farming required wall, pest management, safeguards, and controls to insure that they, not their neighbors, received the bounty of their labor. This control extended to their women and children. Farming created the modern relationship.

By juxtaposing words from romance novels with tracings of plants and pests, I am asking the viewer to consider the nature of relationships and the hierarchy assigned to them by our culture.

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