NeoRio 2013: The Ice Cream Olympics -

Intimate Ecologies: Tastes of the Monument

The Event: A participatory performance that takes the form of a field day, with a number of games using ice cream balls, a fun safe active way to make ice cream.

All the games and related educational activities have been devised to engage with local sustainable and nutritional issues as wells as develop student centered curriculum aligned resources that relate to a localised open source food ecology. 

All participating teams will get souvenirs of the event with special prizes awarded for  best team name, the People’s Choice, and the ‘Olympic Gold’, awarded not for the fastest or most athletic but  most tasty, creative combination of local ingredients. It is hoped that is hoped that some new Tastes of the Monument will be created as well as the Olympic Gold - a unique flavor only available in Taos County.

Developed through an artists' residency, Intimate Ecologies: Tastes of the Monument, in the newly designated Rio Grande Del Norte (RGDN) National Monument the residency serves as a platform to promote the project as well as initiate a related education program; a series of workshops, open labs and educational hikes.

This process serves as a means to explore, reveal and re-mix the (agri) cultural food traditions of Taos County while promoting local, wild and grown ingredients. Also to show people how easy it can be to make ice cream and challenge the conventional use of local ingredients.

During the months of the residency participants will devise games and flavors (with locally grown, produced and wild ingredients, through workshops and play. Participants can also take part in educational hikes and discussions to consider related issues as well as co-develop solutions.

The Olympic event will take place Sept. 28, 2013 at the RGDN Wild Rivers Area, near Questa in Northern New Mexico. For a virtual visit, click here.  But the education program continues until Dec 2013 and we hope the legacies will last long after the project is over.

Long term we aim to create a licensing deal, developing the Olympic Gold flavour commerically providing income for the winner, a local producer and a sustainable funding stream for LEAP's art / education projects. 

• Getting more of those local experts; the artists, educators and ecologists involved to co-create with local young people, student centred, curriculum aligned resources that engage with the intimate ecology of the natural world and the local agri / bio cultural traditions that have arisen from it.

So who wants to talk about food sovereignty and security or the environment?   Boring, Scary or rather not know?

How about ice Cream, playing games, foraging and sourcing local! 

The archive, website and analogue materials will also help share local knowledge that many have forgotten. There are still elders in New Mexico with a wealth of ‘old school’ local knowledge that is important and useful for adults and children alike. With public support  the knowledge that already exists locally can be utilised to create an educational program that is place-based and relevant to the needs of the area yet deeply connected to global concerns.

Good News: We are already underway and have heaps of volunteer hours and support   including event management and production - LEAP and BLM sponsorship e.g. event location, staff support and resources.

We've created some unique perks we hope you'll enjoy as a thank you for supporting us - we also hope you'll get a warm fuzzy glow from supporting the project.  

Download examples of the perks from the here.

Flexible Funding - We've chosen this model as we want to do something rather than nothing and have developed the education program as scalable.

So we can commit to activities as soon as support starts registering and as LEAP, a direct program of Locology, a 501 (3) c means all US donations are tax deductible.

Of course, overfunding is allowed, in fact highly encouraged and will enable the project and it's legacies to evolve even more.

During the 3 years I have been coming to Taos I've become increasingly aware of the local food issues, with New Mexico recently ranked 50th out of 50 for food insecurity. In the 4th year of a drought and employment issues it seems there's a great opportunity to re-consider a different way of doing things.