When I created Green With Indy, I created the tagline, “the circle of life of food”. My vision was of a company that facilitated all aspects of local food production, specifically as it relates to urban agriculture via the growth of kitchen and community gardens. The idea is to encourage residential vegetable gardening, especially for our youth and families in need, and to bring back the family dinner hour. Families eating together and communing around a dinner table in 2023... what a notion! But most important is the motivation and necessity to mitigate climate change and save our children’s future.

I have done the work proving that curbside compost collection can work in Indiana. Now is the time to use the wisdom gained from my experiences to fully develop the deeper meaning of Green With Indy. It’s also time to use all my talents to bring forward the full vision of Green With Indy.

I am an artist. Specifically, I paint. Creativity birthed Green With Indy and now I would like art to help develop its full potential. Why art and its varied expressions? There has always been a connection between the environment and artists. Environmental artists often use natural materials such as leaves, flowers, and branches as the very basis of their artwork. These materials are also the foundation of composting.

Environmental artists often seek to both transform the way that a site is viewed and interacted with, while also revealing what was already there, and how it is used. That’s where art intersects with the environment. This challenges viewers to rethink how they "see" the world around them and pay more direct attention to the minute and distinct parts that make up what we may overlook. Moreover, in choosing to situate their work in specific ways and places, e.g., Indiana, the impact can be transformative. Permaculture landscaping is an aspect using native plants and habitats to save our soil and revitalize grow zones for humans and animals alike. By intersecting art and agriculture we can keep people engaged in what is produced visually and consumed. Crop art proves the example idea.

My paintings reflect the urban environment around us – the people and places we don’t always see, even when looking right at them. The mundane, the everyday, the overlooked. The lonely. The homeless. The hopeless. And, the flashes of hope, of dignity, of community.

I want to use my paintings to raise $1.5 million by 2025 so that GWI has established the foundation to transform the city’s composting ambitions to introduce curbside recycling, with compost pick-up available by subscription. So, through a series of art sales and events we will transform GWI into what it is meant to be.

I appreciate your support in fulfilling these objectives:

Establishing GWI as the dominant Indianapolis home-grown curbside compost collection service in the region to lay the foundation for the rebirth of victory gardens and urban agriculture.
Establishing a networked community of urban growers to share their bounty so that no one goes hungry.
To keep people engaged in composting, gardening, and home cooking as a family by supporting urban agriculture via local artist expressions, utilizing various grow system methods and design.
To educate and engage people in reducing their carbon footprint via natural waste management in support of urban agriculture, while also helping to create a sustainable and livable world. Crucial to this is the use of art to keep us engaged while we all learn.

Having said all of that, buy my art. Join me on this journey. It’s going to be wonderful.

Visit www.gpapi.art to see what I do when I am not collecting food waste for composting.

Thank you,

Greg F. Walton, a.k.a., GPapi.

A WEEKLY GUIDE OF TIPS TO REDUCING FOOD WASTE

REDUCE, REUSE AND SAVE MONEY!

Every day at GWI, we see food waste. We see good food and bad, and all types of compostable waste. But food waste predominates all of the other types of waste we capture. Everyone, without exception, creates food waste. Every food preparation scrap or uneaten bite is waste. Every mold covered dish hiding in the back of the refrigerator…all of it is wasted food. Our ability to compost it and grow more of it defines sustainability. But even so, and as good as that is, shouldn’t we do what we can to reduce it?

So, here’s what Green With Indy is going to do:
Every week we will publish tips on how to reduce the amount of food waste created and share our perspective on what we eat, and why and how it impacts our earth. Hopefully, you will enjoy what’s offered and share, share, share. And when in doubt, share again.

So, let’s begin with some basic benefits to reducing food waste:

It saves you money by buying less food and having less to compost.

Monitoring your food waste directly relates to your pocketbook. If you were a commercial kitchen, this would be called an audit. This is where evaluating your waste and assigning a $ value to it, will quickly identify how much money you are throwing away daily or weekly.

It keeps food out of landfills and reduces methane emissions. This lowers your carbon (fossil fuel) footprint. It’s the soot that oil leaves behind. Soot is not compostable.

The earth is blazin’, freakin’ hot and food rotting in a landfill adds methane gas, which conducts and holds more heat than carbon monoxide. Hands down, it’s the single, most important reason to reduce waste or compost what’s wasted. So, less food rotting in a landfill means less gas heating up the atmosphere. In a nutshell, life on the planet continues. A basic, right? Also, you can’t grow food in a landfill. Also relevant.

It conserves energy and resources. Waste-related pollution involved in the growing, manufacturing, transporting, and selling of food (not to mention hauling the food waste and then landfilling it) decreases. Conversely, increasing the number of small, locally-owned organic family farms reduces our vulnerability to corporate food systems.
It supports your community by providing donated untouched food that would have otherwise gone to waste and shows that we care for each other.
Compost through #greenwithindy. It is the last thing to do that reduces food waste. Nothing better defines sustainability…it’s the circle of life of food.

To learn more, subscribe for curbside food waste compost collection: www.greenwithindy.com/product-page