Añil Cimarrón, Alina Rodriguez Rojo, 2026

The Everglades carry the quiet stories of the cimarrones—escaped enslaved people who carved pathways of resistance and survival through Florida’s untamed waters. Long before the northern Underground Railroad, a southern network known as the Saltwater Underground offered fugitives routes to freedom. Crossing the St. Mary’s River into Spanish territory, many found refuge among the Seminoles and in the land itself.

Some had fled the indigo plantations, where añil (indigo)—the blue dye that once shaped colonial Florida—depended on their forced labor. Though largely erased from history, wild indigo still grows across Florida, persistent and unbowed.

These escape routes threaded through rivers and swamps and extended outward to Cuba and the Bahamas, where cimarrón communities forged hidden enclaves of resilience.

Añil Cimarrón (Wild Indigo) is a contemporary woven sculpture that intertwines histories of displacement, endurance, and ecological memory rooted in the Everglades. It invokes the secrecy, camouflage, and tenacity that once ensured survival and invites viewers to listen for the whispers—of the landscape, of ancestors, and of our collective remembrance.