a heroine's journey back to the roots

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a heroine's journey back to the roots 〰️

  • Black Femme Ecoverse is a multimedia digital exhibit exploring the intricate tapestry of Black womxn's relationships with their environment. We celebrate our spiritual connections to nature, aiming to nourish ancestral seeds of wisdom, challenge predominant food culture narratives, and amplify our voices as sou(i)l sisters of the Earth.


    Our deeply interconnected journeys are an ode to generations who have nurtured the essence of Mother Earth, of ourselves. On this journey, we pay homage to Her bountiful gifts while celebrating the indomitable spirit of Black womxn.

Meet the Sou(i)l Sistas

Meet 'Into the Black EcoVerse' creator — Ugo Ikoro —

Meet 'Into the Black EcoVerse' creator — Ugo Ikoro —

UGO IKORO

Ugo is a storyteller, land steward, cultural archivist, and Food Culture Collective’s first Digital Culture Fellow.

  • Ugo loves all things food, culture, and Black womxnhood! Ugo is a storyteller, food justice and public health advocate, and intimate land steward. She's passionate about co-creating cultural practices that foster healthier and more resilient spaces of belonging with the land in ways that feed our spirits and inspire us to reimagine life beyond carcerality. For Ugo, healing our Mother Earth, our sacred home, and our connection to it is the key to cultivating collective liberation, transformative justice, and a society centered on reciprocity, freedom, and love for all.

  • Ugo was Food Culture Collective’s first Digital Culture Fellow.

    The Fellowship is a 6-month paid term, where the Fellow dives into the question:

    Can our relationship to digital media support our collective healing and transformation?

    During the fellowship, Ugo explored how to reimagine, curate, facilitate, and shape our digital spaces to nourish our communities and feed a food culture rooted in care.

    To learn more about the fellowship visit foodculture.org/digital-culture-fellowship

  • Black Food, Love & Liberation is an archival multimedia series curated by Ugo. Each week, she captured stories of joy, beauty, community care, and thriving (beyond surviving) hidden beneath mainstream narratives shaping Black foodways and our relationships to the land in the San Francisco East Bay.

Much like the microbes that bring life to our planet, we possess the ability to transform our surroundings—composting it and making it anew through our deep care and creativity. 

With, Into the Black Femme Ecoverse, I explore how Black womxn in deep relationship with land and community today are reimagining their foodways through healing practices rooted in their lineages and liberation work. Together in conversation with four Black femmes across the US stewarding land and community, my fellow sou(i)l sojourners and I embraced what it means to be in mutual belonging with the places that nourish us and how it collectively transforms us.

This multimedia exhibit, shares how they are each reclaiming joy, liberation and abundance through relationships with food, land, and community. This project is also an invitation to embrace your own connections with food, land, and nourishment. It is an invitation to ask yourself, how might I care for these seeds of collective liberation and thriving forward with the people and places I call home?

  • I am an Earthseed. Anyone can be. Someday, I think they will be a lot of us.

    Octavia Butler from Parable of the Sower

  • Oh to be a pear tree—any tree in bloom!

    Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes were Watching God

  • I love to think of nature as an unlimited boradcasting station, through which God speaks to us every hour, if we tune in.

    Dr. George Washington Carver

  • In the cycle of planting, growing, and harvesting, we find the rhythm of life. Let us dance to the tune of nature and honor the sacredness of the Earth.

    Assata Shakur

  • Farming is a spiritual practice. It's a sacred journey of co-creation with the land and a commitment to leaving the world better than we found it.

    Audre Lorde

  • In the dance with nature, we find our rhythm. Farming is not just a job; it's a harmonious collaboration with the Earth.

    Wangari Maathai

  • There is nothing new under the sun, but there are new suns.

    Octavia Butler

  • I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired.

    Fannie Lou Hamer, 1964

In the sweet space of sisterhood, we vibe together. We envision liberation, groove to sweet melodies, and move in the direction of prosperity for all who are claiming their abundance, heritage, and return to the source for the betterment of all.

Black Dirt Diggers

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Ancestral Keepers

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Mommas, Sisters, Daughters

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Generous Sou(i)ls

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Momma Earth Tendrils

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Black Dirt Diggers 〰️ Ancestral Keepers 〰️ Mommas, Sisters, Daughters 〰️ Generous Sou(i)ls 〰️ Momma Earth Tendrils 〰️

Grooves from the Garden

The intersection of Black ecofeminism and music invokes a profound narrative of resilience, empowerment, and environmental consciousness. A playlist just for you, curated to evoke the sounds and spirit of nature’s essence and divine calling to us all.

Digging Deeper

Let us celebrate  those who dare to claim their roles as healers, teachers, seed keepers, alchemists, & guardians of Mother Earth. Link up with the ongoing information on organizations, projects, and leaders in the Bay and beyond who are providing abundant offerings to heal and be one with the planet for generations to come.