"Productive Protest" on the Davis F.A.R.M.

Three years ago, Robyn Waxman transformed her traditional front lawn into a fully-functional farm.

Not a garden. A farm. 

"A garden just sits there, looking nice and decorative," Waxman said. "A farm, on the other hand, does things. Lots of interesting things."

She transformed her yard as part of a project called the Future Action Reclamation Mob, aka F.A.R.M.

She did so in an effort to empower young people and "productively protest."

The Beginning

As a graduate student attending San Francisco's California College of the Arts, Waxman became intrigued with the emerging "Millennial" generation.

"They're polite and reluctant to overtly criticize the status quo," she said. "But they're also really interested in defying authority. Their ideas about protest are different from the naughty things we did during the first Gulf War—sit-ins, rallies, marches."

Resurrecting a Sixties term, Waxman held some "teach-ins" at CCA to attempt to put her finger on the Millennial pulse. During wide-ranging discussions, Waxman was impressed that the word "empowerment" kept coming up.These art students were focused on bettering their lives and the community.

Waxman decided that the principles of design and composition she'd read and worked through as a student could be expanded to new applications. As a form of "productive protest" she organized F.A.R.M.

On the Lawn

Today, on Waxman's former lawn, defiance of authority is expressed in scruffy rows of corn, tomatoes, potatoes and more strictly organic veggies.

On a recent "Work Day," a cadre of about 20 art students and friends dug up a recently harvested potato patch. Others trimmed mugwort that had encroached on the tomatoes.

One student handed a visitor a bunch of mugwort trimmings, explaining, "Wrap this in a cloth and put it on your pillow tonight, you'll have good dreams."

Piercings and tattoos glimmered in beams of sunlight as several young men cut back overhanging dead branches.

The first F.A.R.M. took shape in San Francisco, just outside the CCA campus. It was such a great success that Waxman decided to open her Davis front yard.

Every square inch is now devoted to intensive agricultural effort. The shape and compostion of the evolving F.A.R.M. space is formed by consensus decisions made by the loose-knit community of ag, art and other students, along with Waxman.

Half the food raised, 2036 pounds since F.A.R.M.'s founding in 2010, goes to charities including local homeless shelters. The F.A.R.M.ers take home the rest.

Looking Forward

"I really think this form of productive protest is an extension in real time of good design principles, and it's growing," Waxman said.

As the San Francisco and Davis F.A.R.M.'s continue to thrive, plans are afoot to open a new F.A.R.M. at Sacramento Community College later this summer.

Anyone is welcome to join in at F.A.R.M. Work Days, held every two weeks. Check out their website.

Wine and Beer tastings will be held at the Davis Food Coop to fund-raise for the F.A.R.M.s through August and September.