Pictured: Hand_le With Care by Samantha Dennis.

For the first time in 21 years, Embracing Our Differences (EOD) will be displaying its international outdoor exhibit in St. Petersburg as part of its 2024 exhibition season. Sarah Wertheimer, EOD’s executive director, explains that, in 2003, the Florida Holocaust Museum in St. Petersburg partnered with the Museum on the Seam in Jerusalem, Israel, to present “Coexistence,” an exhibit of 35 billboard-sized works of art and accompanying words of inspiration that promoted the concept of “coexistence.” In 2004, Sarasota arts advocates Dottie and Bob Garner, Helen and Roy McBean, and Graci and Dennis McGillicuddy co-chaired the first “Coexistence” exhibit in Sarasota. “The rest is history,” says Wertheimer, explaining that Embracing Our Differences was formed as its own nonprofit organization in 2004 through the efforts of Dennis McGillicuddy, Carroll Buchanan and Michael Shelton.

Pictured: Hand_le With Care by Samantha Dennis.