aNNA wINTHER
APPLE AFTER APPLE AFTER APPLE (2019)
Performance exhibited in In-Context, (Slanic-Moldova, Romania) http://www.incontext.art
Work consisted of: Apples fallen from a tree, four linen bags, glass bowl filled with water from nearby spring, cloth, beeswax and lighter, sticker-roll with drawing of the apple tree and four performers.
The performers collected apples that had fallen from a tree above the hill. Then they form an assembly line where they process the apples based on factory processes: wash, dry, wax and labeled with a sticker marked with a picture of their origin apple-tree. The apples are then rolled back down the hill and back where they started.
Curator: Simona Nastac
Work documented by: Marius Siminiceanu and Ovidiu Ungureanu
“Ugly” fruit and vegetables are a major cause of global food waste. About 1.3 billion tonnes of food is wasted every year and, of this, fruit and vegetables have the highest wastage rates of any food type. Beyond other reasons such as overproduction, improper storage and disease, researchers have attributed losses on aesthetic grounds to strict government regulations, supermarkets' high standards, as well as customer expectations of how produce should look. As climate change and its influence on our lives intensify, reducing waste from precious food harvests becomes vital.
Anna Andrea Winther is interested in deconstructing food manufacturing processes against the produce’s natural habitats, forms and history. Her performance examines the failings of the food industry, aiming to raise greater awareness towards producing and consuming fruit and vegetables sustainably. Four performers, including the artist, dressed in black, act as the conveyor belt of an apple sorting machine, performing the steps of the farm-to-shelf supply chain: fruit picking, cleaning, wax coating, and grading. After one apple at a time has been processed, they are each rolled down the assembly line again, ending in the same place they started. The fruitlessness of the process becomes a potent metaphor of waste.
Text written by Simona Nastac
Curator