Amy D’Agorne is a Yorkshire-born and based photographer who graduated with a BA in Photography from Edinburgh School of Art/The University of Edinburgh and her MA in Documentary Photography from The University of South Wales.
Her work primarily consists of long-form, research-based projects that play in the area between documentary and fine art photography. Her practice primarily investigates the prevalent issues relating to climate change; such as food sovereignty, corporate agriculture, fossil fuel extraction, and the many-faceted ways that late-stage capitalism presents itself, all as seen through a feminist lens.
“The potato can, and generally does, play a twofold part; that of a nutritious food, and that of a weapon, ready forged for the exploitation of a weaker group in a mixed society.”
Radcliffe Salaman, 1949
“…beyond the elemental act of day to day nourishment, food, like gold, functions as currency.”
– Ackerman, 1990, p.129
In Peeling The Paris Green, the roles of agroecology, gene-editing, and indigenous knowledge are investigated in relation to the growing issues surrounding global food insecurity and the need for food sovereignty. This contentious debate is expressed through an in-depth, rhizomatic, research-based photographic investigation of the humble potato.
Through genetic engineering laboratories in the UK, the indigenous-led Parque de la Papa, (The Potato Park), in the Peruvian Andes, deep-research, and constructed still-lives, the project mixes discernibly disparate visuals that disrupt and ultimately seek to confront the limitations of documentary photography.
