FARMINGTON — The University of Maine at Farmington invites members of the community to participate in the first in a series of statewide opportunities to nominate their favorite cultural work to UMF’s New Commons Project.

“A commons is something that belongs to all of us, a communally held resource from which no one can be excluded and for which we are all responsible,” according to the New Commons website. “The goal of the New Commons Project is to build a cultural commons for our community at the University of Maine at Farmington and for the state of Maine.”

A mobile video team will be available from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 12, at the UMF Mantor Library, and Saturday, Sept. 16, at the Farmington Public Library to help campus and community members create and submit a video nomination to the New Commons Project website.

Contributors only need the title of a work they love and ideas about the value of the work for the people of Maine.

Submissions can be of any work of art or ideas, including novels, plays, poems, graphic novels, songs, films, videos, performances, artistic or scientific works, or any meaningful work that might inspire and provide value to the people of Maine.

Twenty-four works will be selected, after which people will come together online and in person, to study, discuss and create around these works. 

Nominations already received include “Walden,” “The Iliad,” “Wonder Woman,” the record player, “Pride and Prejudice” and songs by Bob Dylan, John Coltrane and The Clash.

The public is invited to submit videos independently on the website, newcommons.umf.maine.edu.

The New Commons Project is supported by a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, University of Maine at Farmington and the Maine Humanities Council.

UMF Commons Project