The past few months have been trying for Eleanor “Ellie” Kane. When the historic ice storm raged across Tennessee in January, Kane and her family in Madison endured several hardships, both during the storm and in the months after.

Nashville’s climate has shifted greatly over the past few decades. Extreme heat, unpredictable storm patterns, biodiversity loss and food and water insecurity has not only affected individuals, families and communities, but the impacts of climate variation include infrastructure stress that is often difficult to manage during environmental emergencies.

“We are at a crossroads in Nashville,” said Todd Lawrence, Executive Director at Urban Green Lab. “Climate change is beginning to show that it’s harder to live here with extreme weather. At the same time, not enough people are really listening to those on the front lines of this change — our most vulnerable communities.”

That’s what brought local researchers, activists and changemakers in the environmental space together with an idea to platform the voices of climate change through storytelling.   

“Five years ago, we set out on this journey to learn about what the community knows about environmental justice and climate. That then became an archiving of oral histories where individuals had the opportunity to share how they experienced climate in Nashville,” said Reginald Archer, associate professor in the Department of Environmental Sciences at Tennessee State University. 

“Voices of Resilience,” a collaboration between the Urban Green Lab and TSU’s National Environmental Justice Initiative (NEJI), seeks to address how climate shifts affect individuals, families and neighborhoods in Nashville, and to and platform the voices of community members that often experience climate change first, worst and longest. Kane’s story will join the oral history archive in the coming months.

Although the multimedia exhibition first appeared at John Early Middle School Museum in 2025, on June 11, the traveling archive made its way to Vanderbilt’s Curb Center. It will run through August 4.

On its opening night, about 50 people from various ages and backgrounds showed up.

“I’m thrilled to see so many people from the communities that we serve. … In addition to taking in everything that’s on our walls, I’m hoping [the] people that are here will continue to visit our exhibitions and engage with our artists in meaningful ways,” Curb Center Associate Director Molly Barth told the Banner.

Marge Wozny, an East Nashville laughter yoga teacher, said her motivation for attending stemmed from her daughter’s interest in native plants.

“She got me thinking more about climate,” Wozny said. “For instance, I’ve noticed tornadoes ramping up in the area over the past few years.” 

Participants in the exhibit were there Thursday night, too — like native Nashvillian Elois Freeman. 

“To see the exhibit travel across the city and witness so many people engaging with art, sustainability and environmental justice is beautiful. Art brings community together and when you think about community, it’s intergenerational from the babies all the way up to the great grandmas and great grandpas. It is really beautiful to see,” Freeman said. 

Other visitors stopped by to see how the storytelling and artwork can inspire their own ongoing environmental justice work.

“Food waste is a worldwide problem. Last year, the organization that I work for rescued over one million pounds of food that would have otherwise made its way to a landfill. I’m here to learn more about how increased food waste in landfills directly affects the weather and climate,”  noted Jasmine Bartlett, Tennessee Program Coordinator at Society of St. Andrew.

Along the gallery walk, visitors took in photos by Tasha A.F. Lemley, the exhibition’s photojournalist and oral history producer. Each oral history is paired with accompanying visual artwork — by Megan Jordan in collaboration with local Nashville artists — that best represents the themes of each climate narrative. 

The exhibition was curated with the help of what Urban Green Lab Director of Collective Action Stephanie Roach refers to as “bridge facilitators,” or individuals and organizations within the communities that are already doing this work. 

“Policy is often imposed instead of asking the actual community for solutions. So, in order to amplify the voices and raise visibility on them, we use bridge facilitators like Jaffee Judah of Recycle Reinvest and global ecosystem strategist, Kamilah Sanders. This is to reflect that they share the impact and they can create their own solutions,” Roach said.  

Along with the gallery housed on Urban Green Lab’s website is an interactive story map. Visitors can see where in the city each climate experience has taken place and research additional climate background information, review empowerment resources from the community and explore climate solutions from peer cities across the United States. 

“We really thought about how this activation could reach beyond academics, policy or decision makers … We wanted to reach as many communities as possible and create climate connections that all Nashvillians can see themselves in,”Roach said. 

As the exhibit expands, Urban Green Lab and TSU continue to add new voices like Anita Richardson, a native Nashvillian and caregiver who experienced hardship during the January ice storm, and Meg Wade, an interfaith grief counselor whose work centers on how climate affects the grieving.

“In a lot of ways, I still feel stuck. But this art [exhibit] is a welcome light in the middle of the storm,” Kane said.

Taure Brown, Director of the James Lawson Institute for the Research and Study of Nonviolent Movements at Vanderbilt hopes that Voices of Resilienceinspires change. 

“Nashville’s honorable Reverend James Lawson taught us that justice is not something that we wait for, it is something that we build together in community, one relationship at a time. … The work of building justice doesn’t begin with programs or policies, but with people listening, showing up, and with refusing to treat any being as a problem to be managed rather than a person to be honored.”