Sixteenth International Conference on the Arts in Society

Abstract

In this essay, I argue that big agriculture in the United States continuously destroys the aesthetic values of landscape. Row-cropping practices across a huge section of the Middle-West have also done (perhaps) irreversible damage to the natural ecology. The difficulty, however, is in how the ruin is very difficult to actually see and comprehend. In my arguments, I reveal the massive chemical and technological brutality of this agricultural system. I will then use visual and narrative art as examples and methods for bringing the ugliness and destructiveness of the system to the surface. The argument being that art “sees” past appearances and often reveals what structures appearances. Hence art is a vital and unique way to safeguard the natural world, which is currently our most pressing global issue.