Food production has potential to be one of the core solutions in the battle against climate change and environmental pollution, the protection of biodiversity, and creation of a more equitable society. Half of the world’s habitable land is used for agriculture. Food production and distribution is responsible for over a quarter of the planet’s greenhouse gas emissions, and is the leading cause of deforestation and associated biodiversity loss.

Industrial farming practices damage soil progressively, pollute our environment, and lead to the extinction of plant and animal species at an alarming rate. Agriculture and aquaculture are a threat for 24,000 of the 28,000 species currently threatened with extinction.

As the global population continues to rise, so do our demands for food and water. The current system is unsustainable, and ineffective in a world where 690 million people went hungry in 2019. We stand at a crux in history in which we have the chance to heed science, and forge a different path. We have the opportunity to overhaul a system that has the same amount of constructive potential as it does destructive.

Our system has failed us, but there is another way. One of resurrection. Resurrection of our soil and the biodiversity of our lands. Resurrection of our communities, our connection to the land, and our physical well-being. A way that nourishes our bodies while saving our earth, and leaves no one behind. This project is a celebration of those who share that vision and dare to act on it.

It’s been an honor to review the submissions to the Project Launch Grant because it allowed me to engage such a wide range of photographic processes from across the globe. I was amazed by the incredibly thoughtful concerns and inquiries that motivated the nearly 330 submissions and learned so much about the ways artists and documentary photographers are allowing us to see and better understand the effects of climate change, oft-overlooked communities, identity, and making a place for oneself in the world.

David Walter Banks is the recipient of this year’s Project Launch Grant, which will support the body of work Practice Resurrection. The lush photographs celebrate people committed to sustainable agriculture and the lands and crops they keep. The series is shaped by the dire stakes of climate change, and the need to enact alternatives to industrial farming. The photographs left me feeling energized by the difficult tasks at hand, and grateful for a glimpse into the work of those making changes in how food is grown.

- Grace Deveney, Associate Curator of Photography & Media, Art Institute of Chicago