Kernels of Culture: Maize Around the World is the interdisciplinary exhibition currently on display at the Stephen and Peter Sachs Museum, open for visitors daily from 11:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The exhibition explores what we know as corn, also called maize, in art, farming, foods, tools, and pop culture.
Museum and exhibition content can be found on the Sachs Museum social media accounts. Please check the Sachs Museum page or Linktree for updates and future events.
The history of maize
Where did the grass species maize, Zea mays, we know and enjoy come from? Maize has a complex story from which we are continuing to reap the benefits every day. It begins thousands of years ago with the first Indigenous farmers in Mexico and Central America. They hybridized these plants continuously. Eventually, they domesticated kernels of teosinte to the big and plentiful corn cobs we grow and use today.
Did you know? Teosinte is the acknowledged wild grass ancestor to maize.
The story continues with the Spanish and other European colonizers. In the 1500s, they brought maize to other parts of the world where it was quickly adopted. It grew to become one of the top three cereal crops globally. Our knowledge of maize has grown from the work of botanists. These scientists spent many years untangling the taxonomic origins of this crop. They continue to work on the genetic possibilities of this complex grass species into the future.
The exhibition
Museum Curator Nezka Pfeifer centered the story of maize through its Indigenous American origins in Central and South America. This provided an opportunity to include special Garden collections featuring that important plant. As in previous exhibitions she’s curated, Pfeifer included contemporary scientists and artists to share special perspectives on maize in human and genetic cultures. She also included contemporary farmers in this exhibition who are growing maize for their Black and Indigenous communities.
A key reason to feature maize at the Sachs Museum is the Garden’s Herbarium collection of maize specimens and cobs. The Anderson-Cutler Maize Collection consists of two parts. The first is 1,950 specimens of tassels, vegetative parts and photographs mounted on herbarium sheets. The other is about 8,600 specimens of cobs and seeds. The latter were gathered by many different collectors from the early 1900s to the 1980s from around the world.
Globally, European colonization has significantly impacted the health, cultural, and spiritual conditions and practices of Indigenous communities. The Indigenous people of the Americas have developed and preserved different varieties of maize over generations of cultivation. Black and Indigenous farmers continue to use this plant for food, in ceremonies and celebrations, and as medicine. Farmers featured in Kernels of Culture include Dail Chambers of Coahama Orchards (St. Louis, MO), Brooke Rice of the Kanien’kehá:ka Nation, Snipe Clan (Kahnawàke, Québec, Canada), and Michael Kotutwa Johnson, Hopi Nation and Indigenous Resiliency Center (Arizona).
Photos by Nathan Kwarta, Martin Loft, Michael K. Johnson.
Missouri scientists researching corn
St. Louis’ Donald Danforth Plant Science Center is the world’s top plant science research institute. Its mission is to improve the human condition through plant science. Katie Murphy, Director of the Phenotyping Lab, and Clara Lebow, Senior Lab Technician, created the Danforth display in the exhibition. Danforth researchers study how to make maize more tolerant to environmental stressors, such as drought stress. Researchers use automated imaging, including regular cameras and X-ray sensors, to measure visible plant traits under different conditions. By understanding how roots, stems, and leaves, grow and change under different environments, researchers can breed maize plants that are healthier, higher yielding, and preserve the environment.
Sherry Flint-Garcia is a specialist in corn genetics. She grows hundreds of varieties of maize at a USDA Ag Research Center farm the Maize Farm in Columbia, Missouri. She and her team shared many corn cobs for the exhibition to show the incredible spectrum of maize grown globally. Maize varieties adapted differently to grow at different latitudes, elevations, and climates.
Artists interpreting Maize: Megan Singleton
Intertwining her roles as citizen scientist and artist, Megan Singleton presents us with a new body of work investigating the connections between an pioneering scientist Barbara McClintock, and corn and the brilliant beauty of maize.
Corn scientist Barbara McClintock made discovery after discovery over the course of her long career in cytogenetics. But she is best remembered for discovering genetic transposition (“jumping genes”). Understanding the phenomenon is still fundamental to understanding genetics, as well as related concepts in medicine, evolutionary biology, and more. Learn more >
In 2023, Garden horticulurists grew a large plot of Hopi Turquoise and Hopi Purple maize for Singleton. She used these plantsas material for her series Transposable Elements that includes sculpture, installation, photographs, kernels, and an artist’s book. The cobs’ striking colors contrast with the cream-colored husks inspired Singleton to showcase the exquisiteness of genetic diversity in corn.
Artists interpreting Maize: Waleska Font
Venezuelan multidisciplinary artist Waleska Font presents The Sacred Crop. This vibrant exploration of the profound cultural and spiritual significance of corn in Pre-Columbian Latin America. This series invites viewers to contemplate the spiritual representation of corn and the complex relationship between humans and the divine. Font uses pairs poetry and visuals that feature an explosion of color, mysticism and culture.
Artists interpreting Maize: Student Art
As complement to the global impact of maize, local art teachers worked with students to create maize-inspired art. Teachers prompted students, grades K-12, to illustrate their favorite ways to experience corn. Some were mesmerized by the physical and aesthetic beauty of the corn cob and stalk. Others visualized how they interact with maize in their everyday lives. Visit the exhibition in person (or virtually) to see all 211 submissions on display!
Nezka Pfeifer
Museum Curator, Stephen and Peter Sachs Museum
Acknowledgments
Grateful thanks to Nancy Ridenour for sponsorship of the artwork commissions in the exhibition.
Artists Waleska Font and Megan Singleton
Contributors of research and lenders of objects and images to the exhibition: Dr. Katie Murphy and Clara Lebow, Danforth Plant Science Institute; Dr. Sherry Flint-Garcia, Susan Melia-Hancock and Miriam Nancy Salazar Vidal, USDA and University of Missouri Columbia ; Kristina Hampton, Saint Louis Science Center; Dr. Susan Kooiman and Regina Fairbanks; Elyse Zorn Karlin, John Nels Hatleberg, Tom Herman; Ralph Haynes and Pinckney Bend Distillery; Dr. Michael Kotutwa Johnson, Dail Chambers, Brooke Rice and Martin Loft; Arizona State Museum: University of Arizona; Carolina Holtmeyer, Sandra Giger, Viva Brasil StL; Shannon Hoch, Marilyn Lanning, Missouri Meerschaum Company; Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, Photographs and Prints Department
Jessica Harjo of Weomepe Designs for the design expertise, Andi Kur for the illustrations, and Virginia Harold for installation photography.
Special acknowledgments to Garden staff who shared their expertise and collections on view here: Dr. Peter Wyse Jackson, Dr. Jordan Teisher, Lauren Boyle and Victoria Patrick; Dana Kelly and Jim Kuchar; Dr. Carmen Ulloa Ulloa; Dr. Robbie Hart, Dr. Charlie Miksicek, Dr. Kate
Farley, Carolina Romero, and Aurora Prehn; Heidi Schmidt; Fred Gauna, Tad Yankoski, and Chris Hartley; Mitzi Streeter and Michael Ritchie; Jennifer Wolff and Emily Spuhler; Linda Fiehler, Susie Ratcliff, John Steinmetz, and Rowen Conry.
Especial thanks to the Sachs Museum remote interns who contributed to the research and text, for the exhibition: Annie Farrell, Kyra Tani Little, Melanie Vera, Kristina DeGreef, Caleigh Dinger, Allison Fabrizio, Chelsea Lenay Hecox, Cece Qian Zhang, Pui Yu Ma, Zoe Lee, Karina Ceron, Bee Tham, Mary J. Erickson, Giovanni Aguirre Mazzi, Kimberly Mapanao, Zoe Rios, John Justice, Paris Hubler, Leah Sutton, and Matthew Hanks.
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