The Sankara Seed Project initiates an emancipatory community action practice of sustainable agriculture through seed keeping and collective action. The project mobilizes community members, social movements, and local farmers to plant seeds during the annual Kwanzaa celebration to produce transplants and develop ancestral foodways in food insecure communities while providing education and resources. The project will conclude with the distribution of plants, seedlings, and flowers during the annual Juneteenth festival at 18th and Vine.
Ryan Tenney is a returning generation farmer and artist in his 11th growing season. He is the owner of Sankara Farm founded in 2017 and the founder of a community arts organization, AgroArt, a 2017 Charlotte Street Rocket Grant awardee. His artistic practice has accompanied and anticipated his agricultural work. In response to the current and ongoing crisis, his work in food sovereignty and culture has allowed him to ‘make himself useful’ as an artist producing cultural work, a farmer producing organic produce, and in social movements, supporting mutual aid, sustainable agriculture, and art education projects.