A word from ginger about giving back

connecting the ANDs.

 
 

Celebrating and supporting our common humanity.

My connecting the ANDs initiative is supported by a percentage of my work profits and the Grace Eaton Fund from my school Roots + Wings School of Art and Design (2009-2023). Each year, I choose a non-profit to partner with to use these funds.

our amazing grace…

Grace was part of our Roots + Wings family as an instructor for our After-school Community Design Lab program. She brought hope, confidence, and peace to her students and encouraged them to take risks and stay curious. 

In 2016 we sadly lost her from this earth. Grace was such an inspiration and touched so many lives, and we believe that her legacy of love and light lives on in so many ways. In our Roots + Wings community, our scholarship fund was renamed the Grace Eaton Scholarship Fund in honor of Grace as a way to continue to share her gifts. During Roots + Wings School of Art and Design’s time this fund supported families by providing lower cost and free options to our programming. Now, this support goes toward Ginger’s Connecting the ANDs Initiative : helping to sponsor Create + Connect Portrait Workshops for people in the house-less population and families experiencing grief from the loss of a loved one.

Her family also helped us create several unique sets of greeting cards of some of her amazing artwork, for people to purchase in support of the scholarship fund. There is never an easy way to heal from a loss such as this, but we are forever grateful to have Grace live on in our Roots + Wings family as the foundation of giving back to others.

OPTIONS TO CONTRIBUTE TO THE GRACE EATON SCHOLARSHIP FUND:

  • Check made out to Ginger Huebner / mailed to 573 Fairview Road, Suite 3, Asheville, NC 28803

  • PAYPAL @gingerhuebner

  • VENMO @Ginger-Huebner

You can also connect with Ginger HERE to arrange another contribution option

the beginnings…

In 2016 I was given the opportunity to travel to Cuba on a pilgrimage with my All Souls church community. I traveled as a parishioner, a chaperone to our high school youth, and as an artist.

I brought with me 15 pieces of work that were the first layer of a traveling project that was the beginnings of what I am now calling connecting the ANDs.

These 15 works were added to first by the people in the community we stay with in Matanzas, Cuba. Everyone was invited to add something by either drawing, painting, stamping or attaching a layer of their own story to the work.

After Cuba, I sent these works off to Singapore and Australia, where two other communities added layers that reflected their own stories. When they finally returned back to me in Asheville, I reproduced them at a set of 15 postcards. Each community that participated received a set, with the simple goal that they will then send the postcards off to friends and family - spreading our collective stories even further.

My hope is to continue these traveling series as well as creating collaborative portraits with communities near and far - connecting people across borders…and of all ages, ethnicities, religions, genders, and economic status.

Through the universal language of art, building and impacting relationships new and old.