Location: Lye valley
With the support of youth-led peatland collective RE-PEAT using funding from the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, artist Caroline Vitzthum has organised this stage of Peat-Fest 2024, centering the weekend around the creation of collaborative tapestry.
This Peat-Fest stage has three sessions - facilitated by Usha dapur Kar, Caroline Vitzthum, and Helen Edwards - spaced out over the weekend. Each session will contribute to a collaborative tapestry created with and of the Lye Valley, which will take shape over the course of the weekend. The tapestry will later be exhibited in an art exhibition (details to be confirmed).
Tickets
You can choose which combination of sessions you want to attend by selecting the matching ticket option at checkout. Donations will go towards the extension of the boardwalk at the Lye Valley, necessary due to the extreme rain seen in Oxford in recent years.
SATURDAY 19TH
MORNING 10.00am - 12.30pm
10am - 10.30am Opening and Introduction
10.30am - 12.30pm Joys of the valley - connecting with our local fen through paint, mud and printing
With Usha dapur Kar
In this workshop, we will be taking inspiration from the colours, plants, shapes, soils, sounds and feelings inspired by a walk in the Lye Valley to create lovely earthy images on a shared tapestry using painting, simple monoprinting onto tea bag paper, collaging or getting messy making our own paint with mud from the valley. There will be a chance to enjoy examples of the art of the Gond people, former forest dwellers from central India, for more ideas and inspiration. The emphasis is on making-together; in community, and enjoying the process - no particular experience is needed in painting or printmaking.
This workshop will be partly held indoors (Bullingdon Community Centre) and outdoors (Lye Valley). Warm drinks and refreshments provided.
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Usha is an Oxford-based artist who creates lyrical and powerful mixed media installations and paintings to stimulate thought about the world around us. She has held solo exhibitions in several galleries and also offers creative community workshops inspired by the art of people indigenous to her paternal India.
Instagram: @usha.dapur.kar
Bake Sale 12.30pm - 1.30pm
Bring and share lunch at the community centre, along with some baked goods for raising money for the Lye Valley.
AFTERNOON 1.30pm - 4.00pm
1.30pm - 3.30pm Reed reed reed the weave
With Caroline Vitzthum
During this experimental workshop we will be working with reeds gathered from the Lye Valley Nature Reserve and creatively explore different forms of weaving this raw plant material. Reed is a common sight in the Lye Valley and due to it being a rather dominant, fast-spreading species, it is regularly ‘grazed’ by volunteers to maintain biodiversity and allow other plants to thrive alongside it.
We will experiment with different parts of the plants - the stems, leaves, and seed heads - and incorporate them into the textile piece. The plant material itself is alive and, over time, it will change texture, colour, and shape while undergoing the natural cycle of decay. No previous experience in weaving required.
This workshop will be partly held indoors (Bullingdon Community Centre) and outdoors (Lye Valley). Warm drinks and refreshments provided.
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Caroline is an interdisciplinary artist based in Oxford working with performance, textiles, sculpture, and film. Her works are created in close collaboration with environmental charities, scientists, and community groups to address climate change. Her particular interest in mosses and peatland conservation is explored in her long-term project Speaking Sphagnum.
Coming to peatland conservation from a background in tailoring, Caroline is interested in the interlacing of multispecies relationships and the observations of ecological processes through a microscopic lens. Caroline has recently graduated from the University of Oxford, where she completed a Master of Fine Art degree at the Ruskin School of Art and Exeter College.
www.carolinevitzthumstudio.com
Instagram @vitzthum_caroline
3.30pm - 4.00pm Closing Reflections
SUNDAY 20TH
MORNING 11am- 1pm
11am - 1pm Grass Puppet Theatre - Little Bodies Made of Flowers
With Helen Edwards
We will be making puppets out of bundles of grasses, sedges, reeds and wetland flower materials found in Lye Valley. We will play with the grass puppets as a way of understanding the layers of the Fen, raising awareness of the importance of nature conservation there, living in harmony with ourselves in nature and of honesty, simplicity and interconnectedness.
The workshop is inspired by Helen’s travels in Java and the traditional art of Wayang Suket, meaning ghost of the grasses/ grass shadow puppet, conveying both traditional stories and Javanese wisdom for living well. Whilst creating the body of the puppet we will play with giving meaning to each part of the body of the puppet in turn as a way of connecting the human body with nature.
The puppets will bring to life the movements of the plants thriving in the soils and sedimentary layers of Lye Valley. We will listen to the gestures and movements of the grass puppets, bringing them to life together through dance and movement, and might discover new stories of the valley. Later the puppets will be using to create a shadow puppet play in from of the textile piece made the day before, relaying the discoveries and stories from the workshop.
This workshop will be held outside in the valley, so we recommend bringing warm clothes and drinks. Nearest toilets at Bullingdon Community Centre (5- minute walk).
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Helen works as an artist, integrative arts psychotherapist, eco-somatic therapist,and dancer, having trained in environmental art and dance in the UK, Europe, Japan and Indonesia over the last 25 years. She has an MA from the Institute for Arts in Therapy and Education, Islington in Integrative Arts Psychotherapy. Helen has created artwork in response to ecological explorations across the last three decades, bridging art and science, engaging with intercultural exchanges and communities with a focus on water and ecology, making visible felt aspects of the natural world connecting with nature restoration and environmental projects. She is Chair of Oxford Urban Wildlife Group.
Instagram @artallotment
