Programme Contributors
Rob McBride, AKA TheTreeHunter
A passionate Tree hunter and campaigner for ancient trees of the UK & Europe.
Founder @Treespect CIC. READ MORE here on the BBC http://bbc.in/2rNYV5T
You can read his guest blog ‘Healing with Trees from Windows’ here!
Alice Whitehead set up Save Our Street Trees in 2016 after she became increasingly concerned by the poor maintenance and disappearance of street trees in her home town of Northampton. While the main focus of its work is in Northamptonshire, campaigning for the protection and planting of urban trees in the town and its environs, Save our Street Trees supports urban tree activities and initiatives all over the UK.
Save Our Street Trees believes urban trees have huge benefits for the health and wellbeing of people and the planet – and these benefits are greater the closer trees are to where people live and work. Find out more at saveourstreettrees.org and @saveourstreettrees.
When she’s not tree-hugging, Alice has spent 22 years as a writer, copywriter and journalist specialising in gardening and grow your own, the environment and food and drink (as long as it can be grown at her allotment!). She can be found at www.wonderlandfreelance.co.uk and @allotmentalice.
Artist Katherine Pogson’s work considers human relationships with nature. Her practice uses Lepidoptery - the study of butterflies and moths - as an entry point for exploring an ‘other-than-human’ view of the world.
In the Anthropocene age, and with growing awareness of the climate emergency, this inevitably encounters stories of loss, damage and extinction. However, in taking a moth’s-eye view, this work focuses instead on the requirements for flourishing life - nourishment, procreation and the space to move freely.
Katherine is currently a doctoral research candidate and associate lecturer at University of the Arts, London. In her previous life, Katherine was a designer-maker based at Cockpit Arts, Holborn, and Livingstone Studios, Hampstead.
See more on her website, or follow Katherine on Twitter: @katherinepogson and Instagram: @katherinepogson
Join Katherine’s Live Moth Event on Sunday 24th May at 8:00AM. Explore the hidden denizens of the urban forest! Find out which moths are flying now, and the local (or exotic) trees and plants on which they feed. You may be in for a surprise. Find out more, and book now.
Jini Reddy is an author and journalist. Her new book ‘Wanderland: A Search for Magic in the Landscape’ (Bloomsbury) is out now. Her first, Wild Times, was published in 2016, and went on to win the book prize at the British Guild of Travel Writers Awards. She was a contributor to Winter: An anthology for the changing seasons and is a contributor to the forthcoming Women on Nature anthology.
'She was born in London to Indian parents who grew up in South Africa, and was raised in Montreal, Canada. Jini has a B.A. in Geography, an M.A. in English Literature and a passion for writing on travel, eco-spiritual themes, and life generally. Her byline has appeared in The Guardian, TIME magazine, The Independent, The Times, The Sunday and Daily Telegraph, National Geographic Traveller, Geographical, BBC Wildlife, Resurgence & The Ecologist and many other publications. She was named a National Geographic Woman of Impact in 2019.
Follow Jini on Twitter: @Jini_Reddy and Instagram: @jinireddy20
Picture: Lisa Bretherick
Jini will be discussing Wanderland with Peter Fiennes on Wednesday 20th May in the Urban Tree Festival Book Club. Find out more, and book now.
Jini’s book Wanderland, will be published by Bloomsbury and is available to buy now.
Robin Walter has worked with trees and woods for 30 years, as climbing arborist in London, on the saws as a forestry contractor in Dorset, managing estate woodlands round Wessex, as a site manager for the Woodland Trust, as an auditor for certified forest management. Suddenly everyone loves trees, so how can we apply this enthusiasm to the world before us?
Drawing on this wide experience, he articulates how we might live better with trees, in our gardens, towns and countryside.
See more on Robin’s website.
Robin will be in conversation with Paul Wood on Sunday 17th May in one of the Festival’s Tree Rings Webinars, Living with Trees in the City. Find out more, and book now.
Robin’s book Living with Trees, will be published very soon by Little Toller and is available to preorder now.
Hannah Sylvester is a specialist in connecting people, with nature. She’s passionate about leading guided Herb Walks and nature discovery sessions, helping people to build deeper connections with our native plant life. She has worked as a registered Medical Herbalist for the last 10 years in Lincolnshire, and also lectures on the BSc Clinical Herbalism degree in Lincoln.
Geoff Sample specialises in recording birds and natural soundscapes as fine art and documentary. He combines a musician’s ear with an extensive knowledge of bioacoustic science and the cultural context of hearing music in nature. He is the author of the best-selling Collins Bird Songs and Calls, contributed extensively to BBC Radio4’s Tweet of the Day and regularly contributes to contemporary arts projects from the likes of Marcus Coates, Hanna Tuulikki, Caroline Bergvall and Mike Collier.
Check out his Daily Birdsongs here
Amanda Tuke is a south east London-based nature writer. She writes about the joy of urban and suburban nature and exploring the impact nature has on wellbeing.
For the Urban Tree Festival, Amanda reads a number of #sundaynatureworship blog posts written since the start of 2020 based on her weekly visit to Sydenham Hill Wood
Check them out here
Gail Astbury was born in 1967 and is an artist and teacher. She studied Fine Art at Wimbledon School of Art and has an MA in Contemporary Arts Practices from Goldsmiths University London. She has held numerous posts as Artist in Residence and exhibits internationally. Clients have included the BBC, the Royal Albert Hall and the Museum of Modern Art in Rijeka Croatia.
As well as her painting practice, she makes site specific and collaborative work to commission for both private and corporate clients. Her work explores the contextual relationships that we have with each other and our surroundings. Gail lives and works in London and Limoges.
Check out her event here
Award-winning Canadian, David Merleau is a media artist, performance storyteller and independent audio doc producer living in North Bay Ontario. David creates forest-centred immersive StoryWalks in the depths of the Canadian wilderness. For more information, visit foresttalkradio.ca
Check out the Forest Talk Radio here
Samantha Walton is a poet and non-fiction writer, whose books include Self Heal, a collection of poems about nature and the self, and The Living World, the first literary study of the Scottish nature writer Nan Shepherd. She’s currently writing a book about the deep history of the ‘nature cure’ for Bloomsbury, exploring the science and stories behind this relationship, and considering how the climate crisis will affect our mental health.
Check out her Nature and Poetry workshop here
Tracey Benson is an artist and researcher based in Canberra, Australia. She focuses on issues related to belonging, wellbeing and pro-environmental behaviour change.
Projects explore a range of media including walking, video, online, open data, mobile technologies and augmented reality. Tracey often collaborates with cultural owners and guides - working with Indigenous communities, historians and scientists. Her work has featured in many international and national media festivals since 1996. Tracey is currently an adjunct at the Institute of Applied Ecology at University of Canberra and visiting researcher at the More than Human Lab at Victoria University, Wellington, NZ. www.traceybenson.com
Check out Tracey’s Connecting with Trees in Ngunawal Country here
