15/07/2010 by James.

I went on my first visit to the College Lake Nature Reserve last week. Its a Berks, Bucks and Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust (BBOWT) reserve, near Tring in Buckinghamshire.

Its a beautiful and surprisingly large site, and I’ve driven past the half-hidden entrance many times on my way to visit family in Hertfordshire. There’s a large lake with small areas of woodland and chalk grassland, and a wealth of bird and animal life including breeding polecats, sand-martins, barn owls etc.

I’ve been commissioned by Outdoor Culture to create an installation in one of the bird hides, together with artists Martin Prothero and Linda Cornwell, responding to the site and its wildlife.

I’ll also be working with Ashmead Combined School in Aylesbury, to support reception age children to explore the reserve and their own grounds in creative ways.

The bulk of the work will be taking place from September, but I don’t want to wait to go back until then, so will be making a return visit soon to spend some time watching and recording the insect and bird-life, and finding out more about the site’s history as a chalk quarry.

The ideas are certainly bubbling up already, its a great opportunity to explore how man-made landscape features can be developed for wildlife, and how the arts can be used to support people’s developing environmental awareness. I’ll be back soon with more information, images and artwork as things develop…

In the meantime, for more information on Outdoor Culture just follow this link…

www.outdoorculture.com

And to read more about the Trust and College Lake see

www.bbowt.org.uk/content.asp?did=23523

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25/06/2010 by James.

Another busy and rewarding week, and the last two days of my work with Churchfields Infant School in Redbridge, through Creative Partnerships.

We had our celebration day yesterday, with parents and governors coming in to hear more about the project, see documentation and artwork, and to get hands-on, trying out some of the activities developed with the children during the life of the project. This included a group of parents constructing a shelter, designed through mark-making and modeling by their reception age children, which will continue to evolve as the children themselves add onto it.

It was brilliant to hear how individual children had been continuing their investigations at home, exploring their own gardens, reflecting on the buildings and structures around them to discuss what makes a shelter a shelter, noticing the shapes and patterns on every day things such as leaves and feathers found on the floor, and bringing parents to the documentation panels and structures placed around the school to share their learning.

Its been a really interesting journey for me. We started out with an aim of supporting the children’s voices to be heard, and of using the local outdoor environment in creative ways, with the possibility of generating ideas for enriching the school’s own grounds.

My last session with the Year 2 class ended with us looking back through hand made journals of drawings, photos, rubbings and gathered found objects, reflecting on what we had learned over the last few months, and where we had been.

We then asked these children to think about what might come next, how could their explorations and their learning continue beyond the life of the project?

Their responses were rich, detailed and inspiring, with maps and plans showing networks of enclosed den-like spaces reaching out across the school grounds, connecting the play areas of the different year groups and providing new spaces for talking, playing, reading, and for wildlife.

 It reminded me of the work I’ve also been doing with/for English Heritage, giving local children and young people an opportunity to develop designs for the interior of the education space, and for ways of sharing the importance of the environmentally sustainable features planned for the visitor centre, through engaging and accessible interpretation.

Of course the future of the centre looks in doubt now as one of the many spending cuts, but the opportunity to be listened to, to have your ideas and vision for the future documented, taken seriously and (hopefully) acted upon, is such an important experience. Whatever happens with the centre, and in the school grounds at Churchfields, I hope that we have given the children greater confidence in their creative ability to shape the human world to suit their needs, increased empathy and understanding of difference, and a greater awareness of how people can live in an interconnected harmony with their local natural and cultural heritage.

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09/06/2010 by James.

Here’s a few images taken from a recent drop-in family workshop, that I ran at Salisbury & South Wiltshire Museum for Salisbury International Arts Festival, responding to chalk hill figures with liquid clay, chalk and charcoal.

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26/05/2010 by James.

Its that time of year again when the sun starts shining, the world turns green and projects swell up to fill all my time. Not that I’m moaning, after a quiet year last year its great to be busy again and brilliant to be meeting and learning from a real range of people and places.

Since I last wrote I’ve been continuing to travel up to NE London and work in partnership with Churchfields Infant School. The Year Two children’s journey through the sessions at school and in Epping Forest led them to want to make a nest inspired woven sculpture in the grounds which continues to evolve according to their developing ideas.The school have also placed new noticeboards within the playground containing documentation from the duration of the project (as well as on the school’s website), so that parents and other visitors can keep track of its progress.

The Reception children at the school were inspired by seeing this structure and worked with myself and a teacher to create/define their own space outside using canes, lengths of fabric, string and tape. It was wonderful to see them so engaged for so long. The conversations and the role play around the growing structure was so rich, with writing and mark-making onto flags and signs decorating the outer walls, stars taped to the floor and a telescope built into the walls, amongst lots of other things.

I’ve also been continuing to visit the 5 settings of the Kingston Upon Thames 5×5x5=creativity cluster, with the artists working in partnership with Nursery and Reception classes in schools and children centres.

Its been fascinating to get a glimpse of how groups of children, and the artists and educators working alongside them, have grown in confidence in expressing their ideas, exploring inner and outer spaces through a range of resources chosen to suit their needs and interests. An emphasis has been placed by the majority of settings, on researching how creative ways can be used to support children to access the outdoors and to build relationships, and on the days I’ve visited there have been clear links between settings in the way that children have used string and tape to create webs or traps - winding, wrapping and tying the features of the landscape and each other together.

Its something that keeps coming up for me recently, this connecting of people and places, both physically through children and young people’s play and investigations of the world around them, and socially as bonds are created and new relationships negotiated.

Recently I worked for The Salisbury Festival, the BTCV and Wiltshire Young Carers at Harnham Water Meadows near Salisbury. Here, on the Unearthing Stories project, a storyteller Jamie Crawford worked with the young people to tell and develop stories linked with the landscape and their own life experiences, they had a chance to carry out practical conservation work, and I introduced them to ways of working with willow, creating sculptures whose form and structure was drawn from the wildlife and features of the meadows - the pollarded willows, the nesting swans and the insects that fly and live along the rivers and ditches.

This last week I also worked at an Earlyarts Professional Development Day hosted by 5×5x5=creativity in Bath. The day was centred around the use of Intelligent Materials - open-ended recycled or natural materials that offer no prescribed use for the children (or adults) that play and make with them, so supporting the children to follow their own ideas. This time I shared my own approach to using found, natural materials, and offered the artists, educators, researchers and play-workers a chance to explore branches, leaves, bark and fir-cones together with raffia, wool and string.

And somewhere in between all this I have been making time for myself to enjoy the green lushness that Spring brings to my part of the world - watching foxes from up on the downs, tracking down a long barrow amongst the sweet honey scented bluebells of West Woods, and keeping an eye out for the pair of Red Kites that seem to have taken up residence somewhere near by.

From now on, although busy, things calm down a little and I can think again about how all this can inform my more individual work. I have been working on adapting an old jacket of mine with finds and marks, and have various other bits and pieces on the go, gathering, exploring and finding ways of connecting all those treasured finds and experiences together.

( A quick reminder, if you’re interested in creativity and learning, the Making Waves conference at Bath Spa Uni on 18th June should be an inspiring day. For more info download a programme from the 5×5x5=creativity website events page)

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10/02/2010 by James.

Please share the following information with any 14 to 19 yr olds you know of in the Stonehenge/Salisbury/surrounding areas, who may be interested in this exciting opportunity to advise English Heritage on the development of the new Visitor Centre and learning/outreach programmes.

Thank you!

STONEHENGE YOUNG PEOPLE’S PANEL

WHAT?

English Heritage at Stonehenge needs the options of young people to decide how to make their new Visitor Centre an interesting and fun place to visit in the future.

WHO?

Young people from 14-19 years old, who are interested in design, archaeology, or the environment, in sharing their opinions and having something different on their CV.

HOW?

We want to hold on Open Meeting, and four Young People’s Panel sessions, based at Salisbury Museum, with visits to Stonehenge and other local venues.

Open Meeting:

The open meeting will give you a chance to see artists’ impressions of the new Visitor Centre, handle artefacts, explore the Museum and give ideas on what needs to happen next. If you decide to become part of the panel you can sign up for that here too.

Panel Sessions:

At each session there will be a different theme and content – such as meeting the architects, designing interactive exhibits, and exploring how we can make facilities more environmentally sustainable.

The Young People’s Panel is free. Local transport costs will be paid and refreshments will be provided for all of the four panel sessions.

WHEN?

Open Meeting:

Saturday 13^th February at Salisbury & South Wiltshire Museum, Cathedral Close, Salisbury, 10.30am to 12.30pm (just turn up, no need to book).

Panel Sessions:

Saturday 27^th February, 20^th March, 17^th April, 8^th May at Salisbury & South Wiltshire Museum, 10.15am to 12.45pm (sign up for your place at the Open Meeting).

It is hoped that the panel sessions will continue after this initial project.

For more information please contact James Aldridge:

Email: info@creative-ecology.co.uk Telephone: 07931 407 186

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13/01/2010 by James.

  Not an original title for a post but hey… its everywhere at the moment, you can’t avoid it, and it certainly adds an element of excitement to early January. Things look fresh, shapes and patterns stand out like never before, and our embedded-ness within nature is in-escapable. The snow stops us from getting to places, covers up our cars and gardens, and takes over our lives… at least for a short while.

Personally I find it quite refreshing to see how weather can change the way we relate to the world around us. I know it can be hard, frustrating and even dangerous, but it also gives us permission to play, and to stop and stare at beautiful everyday things. It alters our perception of the world around us by literally changing the shape of things, the way that they look and feel. Wonder becomes a part of our lives as water freezes into clear sparkling blocks, and soft white clumps fall from the sky.

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09/12/2009 by James.

I went in to the studio today to have a bit of a blitz… to clear out old images on the walls and generally de-clutter. I wanted to clear the space and clear my mind and to focus on what’s really important in my work.

But that’s just the point, when I start to think about it I know what’s important to me in terms of my focus and my values, but its not all that easy to work out if/how that comes across to others.

I can know that my participatory work supports people to explore themselves and their environment creatively, because I’m there with them, I get the feedback and I can get involved in the evaluation. And I know that this work feeds me, that I learn about how people can use art to learn in creative and ‘joined-up’ ways.

BUT… when I make more individual work, how do I or any other artist for that matter, know what effect it has on anyone else, unless you are actually there with them?

I had an interesting conversation with one of my 5×5x5=creativity colleagues yesterday, about the relationship of participatory and individual practice. In some ways it worries me that my work on projects such as 5×5x5 is focused on the importance of the creative process, and yet the next day I might be in my studio making a wall-based piece for exhibition, that I will leave and walk away and never really know if it is having any positive impact.

And yet, I reassured myself today that its okay, because, as I wrote in my sketchbook…

the artwork acts as an indicator of the level of personal/environmental awareness, whilst the process of exploring that leads to and informs the creation of the artwork supports the development of such an integrated awareness of self & environment.

The artefact is the evidence of the process and of its effects on the perception of the individual (me).

The creation of the artwork also further supports a sensory exploration of the world in a more focused way, and (if made in the right way) can act as a conduit for the flow of life energy, through the senses, through the individual and into the artwork.

So, as I came to realise after clearing the clutter, and (s)crawling across a rolled out sheet of paper to get my ideas ‘out-there’, how the different areas of my practice link up and relate to each other…

I am researching culturally influenced perception  (its impact on our learning, our behaviour and the ecosystems on which we depend), and its relationship to more direct, individual, sensory engagement. My resulting work supports the development of greater understanding of the relationship between the two, and the gap between them.

I am breaking down the perceptual barriers to direct engagement with ‘the one’ and ‘the now’… my research and my explorations inform my own understanding, which in turn supports my work’s ability to engage with its audience.

In other words I don’t need to make someone feel anything or think anything specific. I just need to provide the audience of my work, whether object based or participatory, access to a place where they can engage with the stuff of the world, and the issues that I am interested in, and allow them to gain from that experience in whatever way they need to at that point in time, as part of their own learning journey.

…Phew!

(by the way, the scruffy dog at the top is Moshi, who often accompanies me on my adventures, and was patient enough to wait in my studio, so I thought I’d include her too.)

Since writing this post I came across the following article on twitter (via @dryearth) which looks at the experience of the artwork by the artist/ audience, and the context within which the work is created/experienced -

Situated Cognition, Dynamic Systems, and Art: On Artistic Creativity and Aesthetic Experience - Ingar Brinck

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03/12/2009 by James.

I was back in the studio yesterday and it felt great - I didn’t have my camera with me so not such great quality photos…

I want to do more map-based pieces on native wildlife and previously native species which may be re-introduced. I’m fascinated by the idea of re-wilding areas of our country, and the red kite, sea eagle, beaver and crane introductions that have been happening or are in the pipeline now.

I’m also itching to get back into some more 3-D pieces, maybe which combine found objects/materials and fragments of man-made clothing or other ‘detritus’, so watch this space….

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25/11/2009 by James.

Its been a while since I got chance to get back on here and share what I’ve been up to.

First of all I went to the Brecon Beacons for a few days of space, air, and mountain views, a beautiful area just along the M4 and up a bit, gorgeous!

It was great to be amongst the last of the Autumn colour, to be out walking and watching Red Kites, and come to a log fire. Here’s a photograph I took of the reflections on the canal near where we were staying, this reflected view for me gives the woods a much deeper, darker, mysterious, almost primeval quality, like a fairytale wood of dreams and stories.

Since then I’ve been busy with the Stonehenge Young People’s Consultation Project again for English Heritage, and have set up a blog for the participants. As soon as that is made public I’ll be sure to put the details up on here.

So far I’ve worked Years 5, 7, and 10, looking at designing the interior of the new education space,  creating a booklet for Geography students on the changing visitor experience past and future, and developing ideas for new face-to-face tours and workshops for Travel and Tourism students.

So its been a case of taking time to explore the monument and its surrounding landscape as it is now and then using discussion, drawing, writing and other creative ways to help everyone share their ideas for the future visitor centre. Here’s a couple of before and after shots of the changes planned for the area immediately around the monument.

This last week I was staying and working up in Lancaster alongside children and staff at the University’s Pre-School Centre. We were using different media to encourage the children to explore and learn from their interaction with the outdoors, whilst supporting the staff to develop their own skills in facilitating child-initiated learning.

We used mark-making materials, clay, natural objects, and a variety of recycled objects to explore shape, pattern, space, height, letter, numbers, and whatever else the children were interested in.

And finally, for today at least, I’m off to Kingston on Monday to run a professional development session with the new 5×5x5=creativity research cluster there. Its aimed at Pre and Primary School educators and will focus on Creativity and Inclusion, concentrating on supporting boys to learn creatively, especially in the outdoors.

So its busy at the moment, which is great, and its all connected and all so relevant to my practice, which is even better!

All I need now is a little time to get back in the studio and make some new artwork…

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29/10/2009 by James.

This is a little gem of a nature reserve just outside of my home town (or village…) of Pewsey.

You can wander along boardwalks through the fenland, across winding streams and past fields of flag irises, whilst the Belted Galloway cattle munch on the surrounding meadows. It has an ancient feel to it and is the perfect place to go to for some peace and quiet.

It’s between the village and the Kennet & Avon Canal, which is handy for a wander back home along the towpath and a drink in the pub.

Here’s some info from the Wiltshire Wildlife Trust, with a link to the reserve’s page on their website.

From the plants, such as Yellow Iris (Iris pseudacorus) and Great Horsetail (Equisetum telmateia); through to insects and birds, such as the Snipe (Gallinago gallinago), there is much to see at Jones’s Mill. Rare plants include the Bog Pimpernel (Anagallis tenella) and Flea Sedge (Carex pulicaris). In areas where the Belted Galloways have managed to keep the vegetation short, the tall spikes of Southern Marsh Orchid (Dactylorhiza praetermissa) and Common Spotted Orchid (Dactylorhiza fuchsii) can be seen. 

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