For the conclusion of the three-year partnership between Indigo Arts Alliance and Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens, we’d like to introduce Deconstructing the Boundaries: Tending to Communities!

Intertwining difficult conversations and hard truths with compassion and togetherness are the pillar upon which Deconstructing the Boundaries: Tending to Communities stands. As people of the global majority, Black, Brown and Indigenous communities have been historically disenfranchised, culturally erased and forced to be resilient. As concerned citizens of the world, we bear witness to social shifts and remain steady through political opposition, economic strife and social unrest. We create frameworks, models, and guides that demonstrate ways to be together and share resources and organize for the betterment of all peoples. Looking through the lens of ecological justice and rematriation, Deconstructing the Boundaries: Tending to Communities focuses on the ancestral, cultural, and historical severance of knowledge and power as a result of colonization. 

Considered through the lens of artists, scholars, historians and cultural practitioners, we invite participants to engage in meaningful dialogue, inspire sustainable futures, and create a platform for innovative, community-driven environmental justice. Indigo Arts Alliance and Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens commissioned the work of writer Arisa White and artist Daniel Minter to envision and create public art works that reflect the responsibility of life, love and identity amongst communities. We will honor our collective wisdom and forge new ways to be in harmony with the land known as Maine and beyond. We will share perspectives on how Black, Brown and Indigenous communities have created spiritual, traditional and cultural relationships to the land since millennia and and continue to do so. 

About Previous Years: 

In 2023, we launched Deconstructing the Boundaries: A Future of Land & Food Resilience. As the initial project in this partnership, the overarching theme centered Black, Brown and Indigenous relationships to the land. The primary purpose was to share perspectives on how Black, Brown and Indigenous communities have created spiritual, traditional and cultural relationships to the land since millennia and and continue to do so. We investigated methods of healing, justice, and land stewardship on regional and global scales. Video recap of the 2023 symposia. 

In 2024 we furthered the conversation with Deconstructing the Boundaries: The Land Fights Back. This continuation of our partnership expanded upon the questions, points of connection, and learning that was provoked in our first symposium. The symposium reiterated our responsibilities as members of a global community, bringing further awareness to the growing climate crisis and its reverberations in our societies. We commissioned the work of Navajo , Muscogee Creek and Greek artist Anna Tsouhlarakis and Wolastoq artist Shane Perley-Dutcher to envision and create semi-permanent public art works that amplifies Indigenous wisdom, artistry, and presence. 

Video recap of the 2024 symposia. 

About the Partners: 

Indigo Arts Alliance is a place where freedom of expression and personal transformation through creativity is encouraged. Indigo Arts Alliance embodies a Black-led, multiracial approach to the rich intersections of citizenship, community-building, and creativity. More than ever, our world needs people who can help us imagine more compassionate, generous, and welcoming human societies. Indigo does that work. It is a great gift to the Portland community, to the region, and to our nation! 

Indigo Arts Alliance is rooted in two principles:

● Art is a key resource for healthy human communities. It should be cultivated and celebrated.

● Artists play a unique role in strengthening our multiracial democracy. We need their vision and inspiration to help build a more humane, inclusive, and just world.

Learn more about their programming and residencies at www.indigoartsalliance.me.

About Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens 

At nearly 325 acres, Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens is the largest public garden in New England. With two miles of hiking trails, 19 acres of ornamental and themed gardens featuring native plants of Maine and those suited to northern coastal conditions, nearly a mile of saltwater frontage, a children’s garden, a sensory garden, and so much more, there’s something for everyone. A true Maine experience, the Gardens is committed to connecting people to plants and nature, preserving the biodiversity of the Maine coast, and continuing to be a place accessible and welcoming to all. The mission of Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens is to inspire meaningful connections between people and nature and promote plant conservation through horticulture, education, and plant science. 

Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens is dedicated to being an inclusive, diverse, equitable, and accessible environment where every member of our community is valued, respected, andappreciated. We acknowledge that a society is stronger, more resilient, and more beautiful whenit is diverse. We are committed to identifying and striving to eliminate barriers that, historically, have prevented the full participation of communities most impacted by inequity. 

Learn more atwww.mainegardens.org.