Tuesday 15th November

After leaving Macarthur Anglican School exhilarated next cab off the rank for Archibull Prize 2011 judging was Caroline Chisholm College at Glenmore Park near Penrith.

It was pleasure to connect up again with the college’s passionate and committed agriculture course co-ordinator Shelley Baldwin.

Caroline Chisholm College has been supporting Art4Agriculture programs since their inception with students taking out major prizes in Cream of the Crop Competition in both 2009 and 2010.

Caroline Chisholm was allocated beef as their food or fibre industry for the 2011 Archibull Prize and paired with Young Farming Champion and agricultural consultant and beef farmer Alison McIntosh (AJMLivestock Solutions), of Crookwell, NSW

Wow Wow Wow the Archibull Prize 2011 judges found themselves totally overwhelmed by what the girls have achieved.

The students turned their fibreglass cow into a “Moo-biks Cube”, an interactive artwork which allows the viewer to flip the cubes (painted in a Cubism style) to reveal eleven different sides of agriculture.

 “It’s aimed at being a conversation stimulator that encourages people to see the full range of economic and social impacts agriculture has on society,” Shelley said.  “Some of it is confrontational, it is a blood and guts industry and that’s element of it some people have to deal with. It will be very interesting for the girls to see how others interpret what they’ve done.”

By using the “cube” concept the students were able to depict eleven different elements of the beef industry

We have created a number of short videos in which Shelley explains each of the elements. We have uploaded 2 of the videos here ( believe me it takes days and days to put these vids together and will load others as soon as time allows)

Shelley said Alison provided inspiration to the year nine to eleven students who collaborated on their Archibull Prize Entry.

Alison’s speciality is data technology implementation for leading beef producers and the students have highlighted the use of technology to ensure tracebility of the beef product from paddock to plate on their Archie. Alison also has close ties to her family beef cattle operation MYANGA. She is also a Royal Agricultural Society of NSW Councillor and the 2011 NAB Agribusiness Cattle Council Rising Champion. “I wanted to relate to the girls on a very personal level, to show them there are many diverse career opportunities in agriculture and they don’t all involve getting dirty,” she said.

Alison spoke about her work and showed the girls a YouTube video she created of her life on the farm. “For a lot of the girls their only experience of agriculture was the school farm and not many had seen beyond that. I wanted to show them that the opportunities out there are real.”

Shelley Baldwin, said the Archibull Prize opened up the girls’ minds to what they can do. “It shows them there’s a whole bunch of opportunities. They can work in economics, marketing, research or environmental management as well as in the more traditional roles,” she said.