Beauty and Biodynamics

John Hodgkinson

One concept not frequently addressed in agriculture is ‘beauty’. That is, apart from the scenery and views from the farmhouse windows or from various vantage points around the property, or the cloudscapes, rainbows, birds in flight etc. Because of the fact that most of what is produced on a farm is for sale, it pays not to invest too much aesthetic recognition and enjoyment in such things as a grain crop or a herd of cattle. Admittedly, it’s a thrill to see top class livestock on vigorously growing and biodiverse pasture, or a high yielding wheat crop standing tall and bountiful. But to label such things as beautiful verges close to sentimentality, tinged with regret that such beauty is fleeting or a tad tragic. Thus, in serious food growing, whether in farming or gardening, beauty in its fullest outward expression is a problematic concept.

Beauty is not an object, but a relationship, a connect. Our sense of it is our sense of the sacred. To appreciate a vital and highly productive vegetable garden, a healthy citrus tree glowing with orange orbs or a contented group of Jerseys, without needing to own or dominate is to escape the ego into a loftier dimension. This is surely what we label as spiritual.

When it comes to biodynamics, its practitioners are inclined to look for more than possibility, monetary value and strict functionality. They are much more likely to seek and recognize aesthetic and experiential delight, while of course keeping their eye on efficiency and finance. If we look beneath the surface of biodynamic practice, we’ll usually find a person who, while keeping their feet on the ground so to speak, has their heart engaged in the search for some kind of spiritual connection with their farm or garden. Beauty does not necessarily absent herself from truckloads of sheep, 100 litre shuttles of honey or cardboard bins of watermelons, representing on the prosaic level, mass production, mass transport, and mass death.

There seem to be unanswered questions regarding this issue of beauty in agriculture. ‘Why can’t our agriculture be beautiful?’ ‘Why can’t our agriculture lead to a more beautiful planet?’ ‘Is it just frivolous to think about beauty in the context of growing our food?’ ‘Why can’t we talk about this?’ ‘Does this lack of conversation represent a certain shame we feel about our inability to foster and appreciate beauty in our farming enterprises?’

Generally speaking, when we tend to value only what is measurable, what we can own and exploit, we tend to deny beauty. We run the risk of missing the point that the truly important qualities of life in general and certainly in agriculture as well are immeasurable and impossible: kindness, wisdom, humour, agape love and the recognition and appreciation of beauty.

It seems to me that the best we can do in our biodynamic attitudes, gestures and practices is to embody and project beauty. We need to do our very best to appreciate the sacredness of food growing, and to co-create with the elemental world a beautiful environment wherever we live and work. Most of all we need to avoid any activity on our farm which desecrates or desacralizes. That is how we can renew and maintain living systems and create beauty.