OTTAWA, ON, March 5, 2020 - A new photographic exhibition on display at the Canada Agriculture and Food Museum hopes to provide a platform for the stories of rural working women.
The Soul of the Rurality in Latin America and the Caribbean portrays women who work the land in Jujuy, Argentina; Pará, Brazil; Antigua, Guatemala; and Treasure Beach, Jamaica, through powerful images of realities that often go untold.
Produced by the Vogue Brazil and the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA), the exhibition aims to make visible the life and realities faced by rural women in Latin America and the Caribbean in hopes of calling attention to their challenges, all while underlining the impact of their work which represents 43% of the agricultural labor force.
Each of the 25 portraits taken by Cecilia Duarte with the assistance of Hanna Vadazs serve as reminders of the resilience, sisterhood, courage, and determination of the often-overlooked women whose work has a direct impact on the global food supply. Descriptive panels within the exhibition space further contextualize some key stories within the photographs.
The Museum – one of three under Ingenium – Canada’s Museums of Science and Innovation - is hosting the exhibition in its Learning Centre from March 8, 2020 until the spring.
Quotes
“The Canada Agriculture and Food Museum is committed to showcasing programming representative of the full range of STEAM disinclines – science, technology, engineering, arts, and math. Through the powerful images displayed in this exhibition, we hope to give a voice to these incredibly strong working women, and invite visitors to reflect on to the global gender biases that touch us all.”
-Kerry-Leigh Burchill, Director General, Canada Agriculture and Food Museum
"The photographic exhibition is part of IICA's commitment to stimulate and contribute to the creation of solid and long-term public policies that benefit the women who live in rural areas.”
-Dr. Manuel Otero, Director General of IICA.
"The images that the exhibition gathers, in addition to a great tribute to the women of the Caribbean and Latin American countryside, are an invitation to society and the media to get involved, a space to raise awareness of their reality, and the need to shine a powerful light on rural women as a step toward gender equality and empowerment objectives."
-Dr. Jean-Charles Le Vallée, Country Representative for IICA Canada.
“This exhibition forms part of a special project between IICA and Vogue Brazil. Its primary goal is to give a voice to women who are true examples of resilience, sorority, courage and determination, providing them with a platform to share their stories. These women are warriors from Brazil, Argentina, Jamaica and Guatemala. We hope that these images will light a spark in those who view them, like they did for us, and that they will inspire you to turn the spotlight on these women, their causes and their strength.”
-Daniela Falcão, Edições Globo Condé Nast
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Contact
Christine Clouthier
Ingenium – Canada’s Museums of Science and Innovation
cclouthier@ingeniumcanada.org
613-410-5943
About the Canada Agriculture and Food Museum
The Canada Agriculture and Food Museum, one of the three museums under Ingenium - Canada's Museums of Science and Innovation, is located at Ottawa’s Central Experimental Farm, which traces its roots to 1886 and is the world’s only working farm in the heart of a capital city. The museum offers programs and exhibitions on Canada’s agricultural heritage, food literacy, and on the benefits and relationship of agricultural science and technology to Canadians’ everyday lives. It provides visitors with a unique opportunity to see diverse breeds of farm animals important to Canadian agriculture past and present, and to learn about the food they eat. In addition to breeds common to Canadian agriculture, such as Holstein dairy cows and Angus beef cows, the museum also has Canadienne dairy cows, Tamworth pigs, and Clydesdale horses. Many other breeds of dairy and beef cattle, pigs, sheep, horses, poultry, goats, and rabbits round out the collection.