Garden of Refuge symposium at University of Cincinnati

Photograph of plantings in the UC Garden of Refuge | Photo by UC graduate student Fatemeh Rezaei

The Garden of Refuge and symposium project stem from UC's strategic partnership in Germany with the University Alliance Ruhr, an alliance of the three leading universities in the Ruhr region: Technical University of Dortmund, the University of Duisburg-Essen and Ruhr University Bochum. Cincinnati shares with the Ruhr a history as a center of migration, and our respective public universities center regional ecosystems of research and innovation for the future.

The UC urban garden, incorporating micro-forest and pollinator garden elements, is a peaceful place of community and wellness for everyone visiting campus. It was designed as a companion to the Garden of Refuge that is being created on the campus of TU Dortmund in partnership with Academy in Exile, an organization that supports scholars and artists at risk in their home countries around the world.

"The event is a celebration of our partnership with UA Ruhr, but also of what the garden represents about our cultural roots and the value of urban and university green spaces to our communities," said Jenni Kim, director of international strategic partnerships, UC International.

Photograph of plantings in the UC Garden of Refuge | Photo by UC graduate student Fatemeh Rezaei

Speakers include researchers from several universities, students from local high schools and members of Cincinnati regional food and community garden movements. Deputy Consul General of the Federal Republic of Germany Dirk Schulz, Honorary Consul of the Federal Republic of Germany Martin E. Wilhelmy and UC Vice Provost for International Raj Mehta will offer remarks.

The symposium will conclude with a walking tour of the Garden of Refuge leading to the College of Design, Architecture, Art & Planning, where a video projection, Rooted in Between, by Rezaei, will be exhibited in the Third Floor Atrium. Also on view in the college library will be original artwork from Cincinnati's Foodshed: An Art Atlas, by author and symposium speaker Alan Wight.

The Garden of Refuge symposium has been generously supported by

• The Harry T. Wilks Family Foundation
• College of Arts & Sciences
• College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning
• College of Education, Criminal Justice, Human Services, and Information Technology
• University of Cincinnati Action Research Center
• UC International

Register for the April 14 symposium and view the full agenda on the symposium website.

Fatemeh Rezaei, UC graduate student and Garden of Refuge fellow | Photo provided

In 2025, the Princeton Review named UC as one of the country's 10 greenest college campuses, recognizing our interdisciplinary focus on sustainability, our green infrastructure, and its contribution to wellbeing on campus. Since 2022, UC has been recognized as a Tree Campus by the Arbor Day Foundation.

The new Garden of Refuge, integrated into the relandscaping around the newly remodeled Old Chemistry Building, was an interdisciplinary project of faculty from several colleges, senior university landscape architect John Martini and an international committee coordinated by UC International.

The plants were selected to include some species in common with the twin garden at TU Dortmund, as well as native, sustainable species. Blooming plants were chosen to attract pollinators, and plants with oversized greenery were chosen to give the garden a lush and inviting effect.

One of the presenters during the day-long symposium will be the inaugural Garden of Refuge graduate fellow, Fatemeh Rezaei, a dual-master's student in Fine Arts and in Women's, Gender & Sexuality Studies. Her fellowship project is to photo-document the plantings in the garden.

Rezaei, born in Iran to Afghan Hazara parents, was an Academy in Exile fellow at TU Dortmund before coming to UC. Having taken part in the genesis of the garden of refuge project in both countries, she understands her work as connecting her own history of displacement with broader questions of migration, community, and ecology. Her thesis, Archive of Traces, centers on the histories of the Hazara people of Afghanistan.

Through archival photographs, documents, ceramics and installation, Rezaei's work approaches artistic practice as a form of research that engages fragments of history without claiming a complete restoration of the past.

Tuesday, April 14, 2026

Clifton Court Hall, Room 5280

Open to the UC community and invited guests.

Fill out the form to register for the symposium. Lunch will be provided for registrants.