A Food Forest

As a result of the project we did in Newcastle, we are very excited to share the news that we have been invited to participate in the In the balance: art for a changing world show at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) in Sydney from 19 August to 23 November 2010.

In preparation for our project, we have visited Sydney twice in the last month. The first time we travelled by plane, but after measuring our carbon footprint between Melbourne and Sydney we decided to travel by car on interstate journeys henceforth; by bike on local journeys and by bus, train and tram on any subsequent journeys. In fact we have made the decision never to fly again until air travel is fuelled by non-polluting renewable resources.

Click for bigger.

The project we have proposed for the MCA is a community food forest. Although we will have a presence in the gallery for the show, the main part of our work will comprise fruit and nut trees planted amongst vegetation that is indigenous to Sydney; bush plants that the Cadigal, the traditional owners of the inner Sydney city region, relied on for food.

As you can imagine, one of the most important elements of a project like this is finding the right location. On our last two Sydney trips, we have ventured all over the city in search of just the right site.

We visited Murralappi, the Settlement Neighbourhood Centre,

Frog Hollow,

Fred Miller Park,

and numerous other parks, but the one we have our fingers crossed the most for is Ward Park, in Surry Hills.

This is the corner of the park we hope to plant out. It's roughly 300sqm.

Before we drove home, we went to Ward Park once more to measure up

to pick up rubbish

to sketch our proposed food growing area

and to imagine the nearby residents looking down at the forest to see what fruit is in season.

Mapping Our Menu

For the next three years, Patrick will be a student again, undertaking research for his doctoral thesis in the areas of ecology and poetics. Part of his research is to document our family's transition from being oil dependent to as self-sufficient as we can be in terms of water, energy and food.

We have solar panels, water tanks and bikes. But what about our food?

We have been spending a lot of time in the garden talking about what it will take for our family to become self-sustaining in terms of what we eat. So, to determine how far we have to go, we decided to mark the beginning of our journey by spending 24 hours eating the food we have growing here in our garden or provided by our chickens, and the public food we are able to forage locally. No salt and pepper, no butter, oil or any condiments. We only drank our own rain water. We didn't drive anywhere all day and we didn't spend any money.

7:06 am
7:08 am
7:10 am
7:13 am
7:20 am
7:26 am
9:32 am
9:35 am
9:48 am
11:07 am
11:35 am
11:45 am
12:39 pm
12:44 pm
1:24 pm
5:12 pm
7:46 pm
7:50 pm
8:13 pm
8:27 pm
As you can see, we by no means went hungry, though we all lacked energy throughout the day, had headaches at one time or another, and felt lackluster.

Patrick: I experienced a mild depression along with a headache. As the head gardener in the Artist as Family, I know how much work it takes to generate our own food, and this challenge - or experiment - really emphasised the enormous task we have of becoming self-sufficient.

Zephyr: Just before lunch I had a nap!! I haven't done that since I was three years old.

Meg: I had a meeting to attend in the afternoon. While I was sitting in it, I couldn't help but feel that the issues that were being discussed that I normally feel are vital and worth discussing, were completely irrelevant compared to the imperative issue of finding food for one's self and one's family.

40% of greenhouse gases come from industrial agriculture (supermarket food): pesticides, fertilisers, tractors, harvesters, packaging, transportation, refrigeration, lighting etc. Food prices are only going to rise courtesy of peak oil. Communities that start to plan for energy descent now will be better off in the long run. What the Artist as Family is learning, is that relocalisation is a several year transition.