Artists resonate with Wendell Berry's move to a rural place

47 years before them, the poet Wendell Berry also made a choice to move. He resigned from a teaching position at NYU to return home to rural Kentucky. Like Shane and Allison, he was born of, and ultimately returned to the South. His literary friends worried. “I received letters,” he wrote, “counseling me to remain broad-minded and intellectually aware, admonishing that I should be on the lookout for signs of decay in my work and in my mind.”

On the contrary, Shane and Allison’s city friends supported their move, contributing to Habitable Spaces’ fundraising efforts. But once the two settled in, the divide between rural and urban America became apparent in other ways. “There’s not a lot of money for nonprofits in rural areas, which is something we didn’t realize,” said Allison. “Our compatriots in New York and Austin have so much more funding. It’s been a challenge for us. ”

Read all of “'We’re All Rebels Here': Habitable Spaces’ Art & Agricultural Project in Kingsbury" at Glasstire.