Julia Mensch (AR/CH/DE)
Field Drawings (Part of Amaranth as Political Agent)
Drawings, ink on paper., 2023-2025
Field Drawings, courtesy of the artist.
The context of the “AMARANTH AS POLITICAL AGENT” research project is the implementation of the neo-extractivist model of transgenic agriculture in Argentina since 1996, when the first GM (genetically modified) crop was released for commercialization in Latin America: the 40-3-2 Roundup Ready soybean from Monsanto (today Bayer), resistant to the herbicide glyphosate. In the research, this model is understood as a continuation of the terricide that began with Spanish colonization, and exacerbates Latin America’s condition as an exporter of Nature, initiated in 1492.
This project takes amaranth, a plant native to the Americas, as a companion: its seeds were preserved by indigenous peoples despite Spanish colonizers’ prohibition, and today, it is the most paradigmatic glyphosate-resistant weed for the monoculture model. Transgenic agriculture promised to exterminate weeds with the use of glyphosate, but today, there are 28 wild plants resistant to the herbicide. Amaranth alone grows undisciplined in 25 million hectares of GM crops, being resistant not only to glyphosate but to most of the agro-toxins used in transgenic agriculture. Amaranth may well be, as Dr. Carrasco called it, “America’s revenge”.
Julia Mensch is a visual artist from Buenos Aires based in Berlin. She studied at Hito Steyer’s class at the UdK, Berlin, and at the National Art University in Buenos Aires. Currently, she is a PhD Candidate for the SNF research project “Plants_Intelligence. Learning Like a Plant,” hosted by IAGN HGK Basel FHNW and the Bauhaus-University Weimar. Her practice focuses on the history of Socialism and Communism, as well as environmental sociopolitical conflicts in Latin America. She has been granted and exhibited internationally, including at Savvy Contemporary (Berlin), Museo Nacional de Grabado (Buenos Aires), Shedhalle (Zurich), and the Sesc_Videobrasil art biennial (São Paulo).