Tesi

Ensaama School of Art & Design

WOL (Women of the Land)

STUDENTS
Iris Da Silva

TUTORS
Richard Devinast, Julien Soubeyran, Christophe Thélisson

What is it like to be a woman in the agriculture field today? Do women farmers, women who wish to start a farm business or who work with their spouse, experience certain forms of sexism? If so, how does it show and what are their solutions to counter it?
As a designer, I wondered what equipment, materials and tools were representative of the lack of consideration towards women, and the mark of standardization based on the masculine body.
Using testimonials and discussions with breeders, market gardeners or cereal farmers, I was able to identify the tasks or moments for which the equipment is particularly unsuitable for the female physique.
Emptying sacks of grain, carrying harvest crates, unrolling tarpaulins to prepare crops, and installing fences, all these tasks require a certain physical strength and can be the source of pain and ailments.
So, I imagined and designed objects with a simple and user-friendly mechanism, in order to facilitate women’s work in the sector as much as possible. Through in situ experimentation, and feed-back from farmers, I was able to perfect my objects so that they are as clever and efficient as possible.
Thanks to these designed objects, my ambition was to offer autonomy to women farmers, to “take care of them”, in a way, and even to boost the transition to environmentally-friendly and sustainable agriculture.