The Gatherade Stand is an ongoing co-authored art project in the form of a lemonade stand which serves drinks made from foraged plants and created opportunities for collaborative creativity around those same plants. Gilian Rappaport initiated the project in Spring 2022 in Portland, Oregon at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. School through KSMoCA to encourage the connection of elementary school students and their communities to the natural world. The platform has supported community building, nature education, and cross-disciplinary art making through collages, drawings, poems, audio works, and soda making.

Together the works offer a reflective moment to receive messages that we need to hear in this age of climate catastrophe. At this critical time, this project asks:

How does nature education fit into the curriculums of public, urban elementary schools?

Where do we find joy, connection, and peace with nature?

What do we already know about nature, what can we recall?

What’s the relationship between pop culture and accessibility when it comes to nature education for kids in cities?

What does it look like when elementary school students share the messages they hear from nature? What kinds of connections become possible?

Special thank you to Ms. Johnson, Amanda Lareeva, Aggy Hosey, Lisa Jarrett, Michael Bernard Stevenson, Harrell Fletcher, Lucia Monge, LillyAnne Pham, Diana Cuertas, Mo Geiger, Laura Glazer, Luz Blumenthal, Laura Glazer, Becca Kauffman, DJ Tikka Masala, Hilary Rappaport, and the Portland State University MFA program in Art + Social Practice. Most materials are sourced from SCRAP, a creative reuse center that sells donated art supplies in Portland, Oregon.

Portrait by Laura Glazer.

Get in touch with Gilian through the links below.