An organization of mixed genre artists who share their works in community — to build community. Rooted in Greater Portland, reaching across Maine.
"An organization of mixed genre artists who share their works in community — to build community."
A Thousand WordZ is a community arts organization that brings together mixed-genre artists — musicians, poets, visual artists, performers, culinary artists, home brewers, and makers in shared public spaces to build community, amplify underrepresented voices, and direct resources toward local and global causes.
Through accessible live events, ATW creates a marketplace where artists make direct sales to the public, culinary artists share their craft, and community members gather around shared creativity. A percentage of proceeds from every event supports charitable causes chosen by the community.
ATW invests in the production infrastructure — sound, lighting, space, and skilled contractors — that makes meaningful gathering possible, believing that when artists thrive together, the whole community is strengthened.
— When artists thrive together, the whole community is strengthened.
A Thousand Wordz was born from a simple and enduring belief: that when artists share their gifts in community, community grows stronger.
Founded by Atiim Chenzira in the East Bay of California, A Thousand Wordz began as a gathering place for musicians, poets, visual artists, culinary artists, and storytellers — people working across genres and disciplines, united by a commitment to creative expression and collective healing. From its earliest events in Oakland in 2005, ATW carved out a space where a spoken word poet could share a stage with a jazz musician, where a muralist's work could live alongside a live band, where food and art and music and community collapsed into one living, breathing thing.
ATW's first major event was held at the Oakland Noodle Factory in 2010, organized in response to the devastating earthquake that struck Haiti in January of that year — one of the deadliest natural disasters in the Western Hemisphere's recorded history. That event set the tone for everything ATW would become: art in the service of community, community in the service of the world.
Over nearly two decades, ATW organized events that raised funds for communities devastated by Hurricane Katrina, the Haiti earthquake, the Chile earthquake, Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines, and the Nepal earthquake — understanding early that art is not separate from the world's pain, but one of its most powerful responses. ATW partnered with Oakland Drops Beats — the Bay Area's first music crawl — bringing together over 20 artists, 10 venues, and thousands of community members across downtown Oakland, featuring the work of visual artists Jack Eastgate, Lorenzo Vasquez, Freedom Bean, Joel Thompson, and master artist Calvin Grey, alongside musicians, DJs, culinary artists, and spoken word poets.
In 2020, ATW's founder Atiim Chenzira led a team of artists to the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington D.C. — Destiny Manifest: In Pursuit of Happiness, a seven-part multimedia art piece exploring multi-generational discrimination and the resilience of Black and Indigenous communities.
Now ATW has come home — to Greater Portland, Maine, where Atiim Chenzira has spent years building community through music, mental health work, education, and organizing. Atiim serves on the advisory circle of Indigo Arts Alliance, the board of Portland Ovations, the board of the Cultural Alliance of Maine, and the board of Avesta Housing — rooting his artistic practice in the civic and community life of Greater Portland. These roots run deep, and they run in the same direction they always have.
A Thousand Wordz is not a venue. It is not a label. It is not a grant program. It is a living organization — a gathering of artists who believe that mixed genres, shared stages, open calls, and community themes can do what policy alone cannot: connect people across difference, heal through expression, and build the kind of community where everyone belongs.
A one-night celebration of Maine’s creative community, presented by A Thousand Wordz to launch an Arts & Culture Fund for Maine artists. Live music, spoken word, work on the walls, and two painters making something in the room while it happens.
No ticket. A donation station stands in its place — give what the night is worth to you. Every dollar past the cost of producing the evening seeds the Fund.
Maine’s creative sector supports more than 18,700 jobs. The artists who built it are being priced out of the places they made worth visiting.
Roots & Routes exists to start doing something about that. This is not a one-time grant — it is the beginning of a durable fund for working Maine artists, held and administered by partners who do this well.
The theme is the one ATW has been asking artists to answer all year: place, migration, and belonging. Where did you come from? Where have you landed?
We are looking for musicians, poets, visual artists, and storytellers to fill this night. Tell us who you are and what you make. Submissions are open now and reviewed as they arrive.
Cross-discipline calls for collaboration. Artists of any genre are invited to respond.
Active calls for submissions, collaborations, and participation across Maine.
Tell us who you are, what you make, and where to find you. We’ll add you to the ATW artist directory and match you with collaboration opportunities across Maine — including the October 2 Roots & Routes stage.
A Thousand Wordz is proud to partner with the Cultural Alliance of Maine — the statewide network connecting artists, arts organizations, and communities across Maine.
Visit CulturalMaine.org →Research Brief · Free Download
Download our evidence brief — citing the NEA, UNCTAD, NIH, Nature Reviews Psychology, and the Cultural Alliance of Maine — and share it with anyone who needs to understand why this work matters.
Download: Why the Arts Matter →PDF · 6 pages · Free · No sign-up required