Sensorial Peripheries
On the 19th of September 2021, the Cumbre Vieja volcanic ridge erupted on the island of La Palma. Lasting eighty-five days, the eruption ended on the 13th of December, making it the Islands longest recorded eruption. The lava emitted from this event covered over one-thousand hectares of land on the west side of the island, engulfing both residential and agricultural areas. The eruption, however, did not only release large quantities of lava, but it also dispersed huge volumes of ash across a two-mile radius from the volcanic site. This profoundly effected the many Canarian banana mono-crops that feature on this side of the island as the ash both irritates the skin of the banana but also infiltrates the reservoirs nearby resulting in a toxic irrigation system.
Near Infrared Satellite Map of La Palma
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Carretera Laguna Tazacorte, La Palma
2022
On the 19th of September 2021, the Cumbre Vieja volcanic ridge erupted on the island of La Palma. Lasting eighty-five days, the eruption ended on the 13th of December, making it the Islands longest recorded eruption. The lava emitted from this event covered over one-thousand hectares of land on the west side of the island, engulfing both residential and agricultural areas. The eruption, however, did not only release large quantities of lava, but it also dispersed huge volumes of ash across a two-mile radius from the volcanic site. This profoundly effected the many Canarian banana mono-crops that feature on this side of the island as the ash both irritates the skin of the banana but also infiltrates the reservoirs nearby resulting in a toxic irrigation system.
This media project documents the effects that situating an intensive mono-crop plantation next to a geological hazard can have on a global food production system. The images presented show the widespread damage that the Canarian banana mono-crops experienced following the eruption of the Cumbre Vieja volcanic ridge on the island of La Palma, in the Canary Islands.
The images were produced in response to a brief that challenged us to create media works that explored the notions of proximity and closeness. This brief was further supplemented by asking us to challenge the roles of sensing practices and their media objects in relation to our understanding of the environment.
The medium format photographs taken for this project document the intense proximity between the plantations and the volcano, and how the very thing that fertilises the land also happens to be the thing that destroys it. This moment can be seen to be a random renewal of the land once the intensive cultivation of the banana degrades the quality of soil. It is the ash that later brings the nutrients back into the soil thus making it fertile again for cultivating the banana tree.
These images don’t just document the immediate proximity between a geological hazard and a mono-crop variant, but they also comment on my distant relation, or lack of proximity, as a consumer to an agricultural system that is positioned far away from where I consume global produce. The images are captured in reaction to the devastation that was caused by the eruption and foreground an appreciation for mono-crops that are cultivated in precarious conditions.
The specific film type used in this photographic documentation has an extending red sensitivity which results in the image having an infrared style. This film type makes the green of the banana crop glow white against the black of what has been deposited from the volcanic eruption.
The images were later hand-printed on photographic paper and assembled into a hand-bound book for future viewing.
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Near Infrared Satellite Map of La Palma
Digital Image
2022
Falling Tarpaulin 
