Nurturing Numbers
How do we tend
to community,
as a gardener tends to a garden?
A garden is meant to sustain, to feed, to support. Nurturing Numbers, calls to focus the continuous need for active care within predominantly white institutions towards students of color. Within these institutions, students of color work tirelessly to build resources from scratch for the student body. Nurturing Numbers was created as a communal space of healing and rest for students of color that live within the Bard Community. Through a series of expressive arts workshops that Maya Elena developed over the Fall semester, Connecting Roots, Mending Space, and Networking Breathwork, were a collection of workshops facilitated throughout the Spring Semester of 2023. Providing rest as a resource and accessible art for Students of Color across Bard’s campus who work tirelessly to create safe communities here at Bard College. The titles are reflective of the questions and meditations raised within each workshop amongst the students. Nurturing and providing restful artistic spaces not only to students of color but the entire student body. Providing access to art and communal gathering as a form of collective and personal healing for the community as a whole.
All the art, rest, and communal reflection is archived within the Garden. The canvases and conversations shared during:
As a group, students practiced breathwork and movement-based exercises to ground themselves in the space and build trust in the group as they worked throughout the workshop. After the movement-based portion students worked together on large pieces of seed paper canvas with a variety of plant-based materials following expressive arts prompting. The seed paper canvases, embedded with lavender and chamomile seeds are physically planted within the bowls handmade by the students. Using the time to slow down, write and reflect on the concept of our roots and how we bring ourselves into our communities, formed in temporary spaces. The bowls in the garden are temporary vessels, made with care, holding chamomile and lavender seeds, with the intention to grow and foster rest over time.
“We meld and bend into the individuals who stand today, shattered, retouched, and fired again, standing tall mended with care”. As a group, students worked with their hands, working with clay collected from Bard Farm. Molding the clay into ceramic bowls and pots together. Attempting to mend comfort, restoration, and support through our interactions that seem to push our bodies to capacities we weren’t meant to push. Taking the time to slow down, and work with the clay from the soil, processing rock after rock to create a starting point. A foundation from scratch. Following the ceramics workshop, students ended with a color meditation. This meditation is a form of breathwork and visioning practice, where every exhale fills the room with the color of focus.
What food reminds you of comfort or home? What memories pop up for you? What meals do you love to share with loved ones? Together as a group, students shared dishes that brought us comfort growing up and their recipes. On Bard’s campus it can be difficult to obtain ingredients to make our authentic comfort meals from home. For students who couldn’t bring the food that they love, they brought food that brings them comfort now to share. During the potluck students came together to reflect and share what rest means to them and reflect on the semester as well as their time here at Bard. After the potluck, students came full circle, coming back to the canvases they worked on together when they were first getting to know one another. Planting their seeds and conversations at the garden together.