Support Aboubakar Fofana’s Indigo Farm Project

Our friend and artist Aboubakar Fofana has spent the past 10 years building a vibrant farm in rural Mali, West Africa, to cultivate indigo and grow food. The farm is key to Aboubakar’s vision to use indigenous fibers, weaving, mud pigments and indigo to create his body of work and he is the only Malian indigo artist who grows his own organic indigo. The farm, studio and the other groups Aboubakar works with employs over 120 craftspeople including cotton farmers, spinners, weavers, blacksmiths, wood workers and villagers, who supplement their income and develop skills under Aboubakar’s guidance. The farm is self-funded by Aboubakar, and his travel and work supports the farm, his studio in Bamako and his extended family.

Aboubakar says:

It begins with a seed. One seed goes into the ground and becomes green leaves. Each indigo leaf grows and then is transformed into the natural dye we love. The farm is more than a farm. The land sustains us and is the source of raw materials. Without it, my work would not exist. It is a refuge for the lost art of natural Indigo dying and much more.  

Aboubakar’s land needs an upgraded irrigation system so he can collect rainwater for his indigo crops, expand his growing area and mend fences. In addition, his studio requires some much-needed maintenance work. We’ve created a space for donations to support his efforts. Can you help us give back to him? For all that he’s given to us as an indigo educator, artist and farmer?

Aboubakar is currently deeply involved in creating a farm in conjunction with the local community in the district of Siby, Mali. The two types of indigenous West African indigo (Indigofera arrecta and Philenoptera cyanescens) will be the centerpiece for a permaculture model. Therefore, this model is based around local food, herbal medicine and dye plants. This project hopes to contribute to the rebirth of fermented indigo dyeing in Mali and beyond. Additionally, it represents his life’s greatest project to date.

His work stems from a profound spiritual belief that nature is divine and believes that through respecting this divinity, we can understand the immense and sacred universe. His raw materials come from the natural world and his working practice revolves around the cycles of nature (birth, decay and change), and the impermanence of these materials.