TREES

 This is an urban tree that seems to be using autumn as an attempt to blend into its surroundings.The tree project has made me notice trees more. Perhaps this is the point. Radical hope was good on Friday I forgot I said I would contribute which was useful as I'm at my best when I improvise.  The story of Sitting Bulls horse dancing when he was shot in the shoulder on Res is both poetic and sad. Vanessa Toulman told me about it, she is a living connection to Wild Bill Cody. It is a story that does not need to have actually happened for it to be true.  I was pleased that the session went so well, for me it was proof that working remotely can on occasion bring us together. The technology got in the way but it also enabled something else to happen.  Reading about Plenty Coups has made me think about trying to live a good life as an artist - how I still try to collect coups but they have stopped making sense in a world that is fast changing.  Noticing the tree above...

 Me and Samyia met Jenna to talk about COP 26.  Apparently it was actually really good in that activists were getting involved in very complex negotiations. The way it works is that they work directly with the civil service and they think about how to make change happen at a meso level. Activism can be many things, and some times it is not enough just to write placards and go on a march.  I have been thinking about hope this week for our hope critical discussion group. Johan has asked us to think about Lear's concept of radical hope. Here is an excerpt of the book chapter he asked us to read: What makes this hope radical is that it is directed towards a future goodness that transcends the current ability to understand what hope is. Radical hope anticipates a good for which those who have the hope as yet lack the appropriate concepts with which to understand it. What would it be for such hope to be justified? I have also been reading Rebecca Solnit in the Guardian who work...

 I am increasingly bothered by Trees and Land.  When I was at the Forest Research conference there were a lot of landowners who talked about the way they had worked with their land and made it better for the next generation. It was all very nice but concerning  in that if you didn't have access to extensive grounds this was all a bit difficult.  I decided that:  1) I was obviously bad as I do co-own a wood (West Wood in Dorset) albeit with my brothers and helped by my lovely cousin Bill who practically lives in a wood with his volunteers who are all burnt out NHS executives.  West Wood is co-curated with Sean from Natural England, a friar from the Hilfield Friary and assorted dog walkers and farmers. Bill made me a shed in it.    2) Our project is clearly super important as it is about the way that people have a sense of belonging in woods and how this comes from the act of being in a wood.  Being in a wood is hard and scary - when I first we...

We went into Seymour Park Primary School yesterday. Samyia and I got lost and when we arrived Khawla was anxiously looking out for us. When we went into the school there was the usual signing in and DBS thing, and then the headteacher was there, and I told him about how the video with the Seymour Park children in it was in COP 26.  We each had three year 3 forms - this is a 3 form entry school. We had to work quickly to explain the project and to ask the children for ethical permission. However, when I started to explain the project I realised that the words 'voice' and children' and 'trees' were really useful - these were words the children understood and could relate to.  What I was really pleased about was how quickly the children understood that they were the scientists and would ask questions. The questions were about how much water is in a tree, and the rings on the tree.  I asked them to think about the future and asked about whether the future was tomorrow, ...

  I spent the weekend going Feral. It was a yoga weekend with a load of people from Hebden Bridge and Todmorden. They go wild swimming and walking and wild swimming. I quite like wild swimming, but this time, with some of the Wild Swimming gang from Todmorden, I swam for longer and felt more interested in the feeling of being in the landscape, rather than just the excitement of cold water. I swam for longer and felt more immersed. We went walking with a ranger who taught us to listen and watch the landscape and be in it in a different way. I was with some really interesting people, who do art and tree stuff and they helped me think a bit more about the concept of belonging in Treescapes. I think we assume that belonging is about land ownership, and that is why I am so glad Colin from Aberdeen is in the project, because he is passionate about the idea of common land.  I realised, in the Lake District, that belonging is about sensing and being, and inhabiting a space as a kind o...

  I feel guilty chopping up this tree stump in our garden.  Not only was it clinging onto its last bit of Carbon it was providing habitat for all sorts of plants and animals.  The reason for digging it up was to provide a flat place where I would be able to play badminton with my grandchildren.  As none of them are yet conceived the stump removal seems premature.  COP has just started and the environment has taken center stage for  a brief moment.  The world is falling apart but we are still expecting year on year economic growth, a central contradiction that nobody feels comfortable with yet few can think of doing anything about.   I first started working in schools on projects with friends of the earth raising awareness of the impending environmental disasters in the early 1990's. Later I was involved in Tipping Point program listening to angry scientists fighting about whether oil or wind killed the most seabirds.  Then multiple art s...