Ebb and Flow: Art, Sustainability, and Culinary Connections

Join us as we celebrate the exhibition “Without You (I’m an Empty Shell)” by Andrea Spiridonakos, NAM’s October ’24 Artist in Residence (AiR), and raise awareness for New England’s sustainable seafood industry and marine ecosystems.

• Artist Talk: Andrea Spiridonakos will discuss her AiR experience, her portfolio, and how her work highlights the importance of nurturing our coastal community.
• Discussion: Kate Maury from Eating with the Ecosystem will join Mary Parks from GreenCrab.org to discuss Rhode Island’s vital shellfish industry and explore the impact of European green crabs on wild and farmed oysters. Kate and Mary will then discuss culinary solutions and why eating invasive and underutilized species is a key for a resilient food system.
• Oyster Bar: Features local farm-raised oysters
• Libations: Featured Cocktail —  The Green Crab Bloody Caesar,  Craft Beer, and Wine

Admission includes Artist talk/panel discussion, oyster bar, finger foods, and one drink ticket.

This joint fundraiser will benefit the Museum and GreenCrab.org‘s mission, building culinary markets for European green crab and spreading awareness of its invasive impact across the globe.

Andrea Spiridonakos has a practice driven by process, experimentation, and detail, through various mediums such as fiber art, decorative art, and installation. Spiridonakos holds a degree in Fashion Design from the Fashion Institute of Technology in NYC. She began her career as a professional ballerina who danced leading roles on stages across the US & Europe to literary acclaim. Now, as the creative force behind her studio, Spiridonakou, her debut fashion collection sold at NYC’s legendary Bergdorf Goodman. Spiridonakos has exhibited at Musée des Arts Décoratifs (Paris) in collaboration with the Métiers d’Arts, Chanel, the Bergdorf Goodman windows (NYC), FAU Ritter Gallery (Boca Raton), Big Art Now Gallery (West Palm Beach) and solo exhibitions at the Coral Gables Museum and the Miami Design District.

Her artwork is acquired into the permanent collection at the DeYoung Museum (San Francisco) and in private collections in the US. She was selected as part of the “Excellence In Fibers IX” juried exhibit for Fiber Art Now magazine (cover, Winter 2024) & featured in and on the back cover of Assouline’s book “Miami Beach” (2020). Andrea is a 2020 Knight Foundation NEW WORK grantee, a Miami Artist Support grantee, an FSF scholar and a Critic’s Choice Award (2015) through FIT. She’s created hand-painted textiles for Isabel † & Ruben Toledo as well as designed a 2023 world premiere commission for Miami City Ballet by choreographer Pontus Lidberg.

Mary Parks is the Executive Director of GreenCrab.org and grew up in Penobscot Bay where she started trapping and eating green crabs in middle school. She first learned about green crab’s invasive impact from the surrounding lobstering and clamming community. She went on to study the invasive at Colby College, graduating with a dual degree in Biology and Environmental Science with a concentration in fisheries.

After working in traceability for a commercial fish wholesaler in Boston and learning more about bait markets for green crabs, she started asking what needed to be done to build a culinary market and expand the fishery. In 2020 she went on to found GreenCrab.org, a nonprofit dedicated to building culinary markets for European green crab and spreading awareness of its invasive impact. She now lives in Providence, RI where she also runs Soft Shell Creative.

Kate Masury is the Executive Director of Eating with the Ecosystem, a non-profit dedicated to promoting a place-based approach to sustaining New England’s local seafood. She works to strengthen connections across the seafood supply chain, bringing together fishermen, seafood businesses, chefs, researchers, and policymakers to create a more resilient, sustainable seafood system.

Kate leads educational programs, supply chain facilitation, research initiatives, and public awareness campaigns, helping to increase access to local seafood, including efforts to bring seafood into schools and the emergency food system. She also consults with restaurants and seafood businesses on sourcing local seafood and diversifying species selections.

A member of Food Solutions New England, the Local Catch Network, and the Rhode Island Seafood Marketing Collaborative, Kate is committed to fostering a deeper connection between seafood eaters and the ecosystems, communities, and people who harvest their food.