Holy Forest Farm sits on 80 acres of mostly forested agri-land with a spring-fed pond that stretches 1 acre and land along Kinderhook Creek. It exists on the Sovereign Indigenous Nation and ancestral land of the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohicans. We grow and gather in deep reverence for their spirit and their generations of stewardship. 

At the heart of HHF is a commitment to what are sometimes called in the U.S., Afro-ecological farming practices. We draw upon traditional African wisdom, principles of ecological farm design and regenerative techniques in order to create thriving ecosystems that nourishes both people and the planet.

The overarching goal at HFF is to create a model of sustainable agriculture that not only produces nutritious food but also plays its part to heal what we have disturbed on the planet, strengthen community, and uplift populations being perpetually marginalized. We believe that farming can be a catalyst for social change. That it can connect communities of color driven from and oppressed on the land. That farms can create space for empowering refugees to rebuild their lives, reclaim their cultural heritage, cultivate a sense of belonging in their new surroundings and share their wisdom and culture.

The impact we hope to achieve is multi-faceted. By providing community with access to a welcoming environment, with support, cultural enrichment and healthy food, we hope to empower them to build resilience in the face of adversity and connect to opportunities that will allow them to not just survive but to thrive. 
Through education, advocacy, and collective action, we will continue to strive to create a more just and resilient food system that honors the inherent dignity and worth of all people, regardless of their background or circumstance.

Originally from The Gambia, Diana is a contemporary Visual Artist and Farmer. Diana’s maternal grandmother was a vegetable farmer and market woman, selling traditionally crafted goat’s milk yogurt and beautiful pyramids of deeply flavorful, heirloom tomatoes she’d cook down into bright, naturally zestful tomato paste for market and her community.

Always drawn to the ways in which nature's presence or its absence shapes us, Diana became ever more curious about the inextricable link between food and ecology after moving to rural, upstate NY. Thousands of miles away from her homeland, she felt compelled to connect with her grandmother’s wisdom by placing her hands in the soil to touch the roots of her knowing, the knowing within us all. A ritual and meditation that continues to inform her art practice.

After witnessing profound climate and other crises give rise to the mass movement of Wolof people, a tribe indigenous to the Senegambia region and southern Mauritania, she began working with Wolof-speaking refugees as a translator and facilitator in their pursuit for legal status and/or asylum in New York. Thus, Holy Forest Farm (HFF) has evolved to become more than an environment where we grow food in partnership with the natural world. It is a sanctuary outside of the industrial food system for those seeking a connection to land—one that fosters resilience, restores dignity and food sovereignty amongst diasporic communities of BIPOC people, empowering individuals to become stewards of their own futures.