Celebration

People to Place

 

Whitstable Oyster Festival

If there is a local event celebrating place then this is it! It’s a celebration of Oysters, Whitstable grows Natives in the intertidal zone along its coastline and apparently 2000 year old Whitstable Oyster shells have been excavated from modern Rome.

 

Oyster image from festival brochure.

It is celebrated throughout the week. There has been many activities that are based around oysters and the sea, my favourite is the building of Grotters. This happens in the festival towards the end of the week on one of the beaches. Discarded oyster shells are used to create a cairn type of tower in which a candle is lit. Over the years, so many people have joined in, that now the spectacle stretches out all along the beaches. It is a wonderful sight to come down as the sunsets and see the Grotters glowing. I have noticed over the last few years that the basic form of the Grotter is being adapted so there are many more skilfully sculptural versions being created.

 

Grotter image from the festival brochure.

I remember one year, a while back, the artist Stephen Turner worked on a huge Grotter with the community, which was then lit and was a wonderful sight.

Foraging

I was lucky enough to be asked to join a friend on her pre-event recce early one morning last week. Today, as part of the oyster festival she is leading a forage walk from the town to the shore, sharing her knowledge of edible plants and seaweeds. Jo Barker is an extremely talented and knowledgeable lady.  Whilst studying landscape architecture in the late 1980’s she discovered Permaculture, a practice that she is passionate about. Permaculture is a way of creating harmony, it derives from the two words, permanent and (human) culture. It is a sustainable way of living and has many principles, which when acknowledged create an abundant and wonderful connection to nature. Foraging is a practice that allows humans to remember that we are part of the landscape and recognise the changing seasons of the year. I love this reminder that we are also animals and can graze on healthy plantstuffs for free throughout the year.

 

One of Jo Barkers wonderful seasonal foraged mandalas.

Jo creates beautiful mandalas of the food that she forages on each trip out and they themselves serve as reminders of the time and place, seasons, natural beauty and abundance. I would love to incorporate her knowledge into the walks that I devise, as to see the land as a larder is something most of us have grown away from. Unless we grow our own food at home, the brightly lit food stores of major name supermarkets are the main places that we see as our food supply source.

Seaweed

The last time I really had a good look for seaweed to eat was just before Easter, earlier this year. I had travelled up to the West coast of Scotland to be introduced to an area that I am still hoping to create a walking project in.

Sanna Bay

Arlette had told us of a bay which was reached through a volcanic crater, on the furthest west of the peninsular. That journey in itself sounded exciting. The beautiful white sands of the bay, the blue water and fresh air took us by surprise too. It had a dreamlike quality and we spent a while looking for different seaweeds to take home and identify. Arlette recognised most of them, one she particually sought was Pepper Dulse, it seemed to grow under another one on the top of the dark, volcanic rock. We picked it, in various places, so not to over harvest one area and ate it, freshly washed in seawater. It was delicious.

 

Pepper Dulse

That is a memory I will keep, feeling connected to a new place through recognising the abundance of nature in the area by grazing on it!

Landmarks

Landmarks such as volcanic craters are rare in this country, but through my research and design experience I have studied spatial awareness and know just how important it is that we observe and recognise our surroundings.

My logo is made up of simplified landmark symbols. A lake/loch, a significant place/centre and a hill/mountain.

We mentally map places and create awareness in our minds that we can refer to when exploring an area. This experiential exploration has a name, it is called Phenomenology.  It is from the Greek: phainomenon, ‘that which appears’ and logos, ‘study’. The best book that I came across in my MA study that refers to this is ‘The Spell of the Sensuous’ by David Abram.

 I highly recommend it to anyone who has a desire to feel more in touch with our collective ancestry and how we perceive the land we inhabit. This book asks ‘How did humans come to sever their ancient reciprocity with the natural world and what will it take for us to recover a sustaining relation with the breathing earth?’

There is a quote from Gary Synder, a poet, at the start of the book that says it all.

As the crickets’ soft autumn hum

Is to us

So are we to the trees

As are they

To the rocks and the hills

Poetry

I have always loved poetry. I recognise now that I understand it through a form of phenomenology. I experience the words, lines and overall form in this way. Poetry transports me. Chris Jelley, the Storywalk artist that I have worked with has got another unique project on the go. It is called ‘Poetry Pin’ and is ‘a geo-located digital repository for fresh and new site specific poetry’. Based on a path which has become dislocated from the coast due to the redevelopment of Hinkley C power station in Somerset, it allows people to ‘pin’ their poetry in the actual place that it was inspired by. There are monthly artist led walks over the year that encourages participation.

Chris Jelley in action, image is his own.

Personally, I wonder if paths can have their own poem. I would love to explore this. To walk a path with a poet, to see them inspired by the view, route undulation, surface, momentum etc would be inspiring in itself.

This idea could be widened, as to walk the same route with an opera singer, a yoga teacher, an engineer, a potter etc could open so many avenues/paths of thought. What a wonderful project that could be in itself. And if attached to one of my paths, well, it could be shared amongst a wider audience and be a delight for all.

(I completed my MA last September and recorded the last two months of it in another blog called thesaltwayfarer.blogspot.co.uk