Hearing another IPCC scientist speak so well of the Peoples' Earth Charter is great.
I too suffer from what to write to my Haumea Ecoversity community for professional creatives.
Nevertheless, blogging was my creative practice for my creative practice PhD and I also found out that writing, and reflecting on others' works and text, helped develop my ecoliteracy and agency to stand up for the small forest I live with a new-to-Ireland ecological forest policy (quite something for an introverted artist/former scientist hollywoodforest.com).
A bit braver and clearer, in the last 5 years, I now teach ecoliteracy and the extraordinary-that-it-exists-in-our-divided world– the peoples' Earth Charter –to other creatives, artists, changemakers and cultural policy writers as the most impactful thing I can do. I have managed to quietly insert it into Green Party arts and heritage policy here too and I now write for this growing more confident eco-creative community of practice.
I'm sorry I never got to attend your wonderful course in Norway like I hoped, the change to in-person didn't suit me for ethical and financial reasons, but I have your treasure of a book that connects creativity to quantum social change 'You Matter More than You Think!'
During the last few weeks, I've been enchanted by the quantum randomness of seeing how my heart was drawn to share about the peoples' Earth Charter over recent years, and how it has come alive in magical, inspiring ways through other creatives' skills.
I shared the Earth Charter here in Ireland (where it is little known) to inclusive social community artists (Angelina Foster and her creative collaborators in Kildare, Ireland) who invited youth, theatre, the local sign language community, scouts, conservationists and elders to workshops to discuss what matters most to them and the environmental, social and peace principles of the peoples' Earth Charter.
The artists then asked participants to put their hands in paint and print their handprints on small squares of upcycled cloth, dyed with plants near the local river they were celebrating. They then asked participants to choose a symbol of one of the Earth Charter principles that most resonated with them and that symbol was screen printed over their handprint. Strung together, these printed handprints–with the values that matter most to all these people, young and old, were strung around a pilot Future Ancestor festival - like prayer flags for 'the community of life'!
I was startled by how principles for a better world, conflated with handprints on recycled scraps of fabric, moved me! Echoes of humanity's moral evolution from cave handprint times were sensitively made real, meaningful and personal in such humble ways. I can only imagine how activated the values conversations and holistic learning were between generations.
This type of work has a name that I've found from them and their wonderful Greek activist advisor Dr Asta Papachristodoulou - 'visual poetry'. I wish more ecoliterate visual poets, ecological philosophers and values educators were at the table with our leaders as that moves
people's conscience more so than policy, although of course policy is important too.
But something is failing in communications globally, something has been overlooked to reach peoples' hearts.
Thanks again Karen for your posts and your reflections,
from a small thriving wood in rural Ireland here under a wintry sky,
and from many eco-creatives too -as I will be sharing your post above with them for sure :)
PS be great if you could make, or share news about the 25th global celebrations of the Earth Charter, at the Peace Palace in the Hague next July.
I feel inspired by this post, and the valuable references: The act of writing is quantum social change in action!
Oh thank you, thank Karen,
Hearing another IPCC scientist speak so well of the Peoples' Earth Charter is great.
I too suffer from what to write to my Haumea Ecoversity community for professional creatives.
Nevertheless, blogging was my creative practice for my creative practice PhD and I also found out that writing, and reflecting on others' works and text, helped develop my ecoliteracy and agency to stand up for the small forest I live with a new-to-Ireland ecological forest policy (quite something for an introverted artist/former scientist hollywoodforest.com).
A bit braver and clearer, in the last 5 years, I now teach ecoliteracy and the extraordinary-that-it-exists-in-our-divided world– the peoples' Earth Charter –to other creatives, artists, changemakers and cultural policy writers as the most impactful thing I can do. I have managed to quietly insert it into Green Party arts and heritage policy here too and I now write for this growing more confident eco-creative community of practice.
I'm sorry I never got to attend your wonderful course in Norway like I hoped, the change to in-person didn't suit me for ethical and financial reasons, but I have your treasure of a book that connects creativity to quantum social change 'You Matter More than You Think!'
During the last few weeks, I've been enchanted by the quantum randomness of seeing how my heart was drawn to share about the peoples' Earth Charter over recent years, and how it has come alive in magical, inspiring ways through other creatives' skills.
I shared the Earth Charter here in Ireland (where it is little known) to inclusive social community artists (Angelina Foster and her creative collaborators in Kildare, Ireland) who invited youth, theatre, the local sign language community, scouts, conservationists and elders to workshops to discuss what matters most to them and the environmental, social and peace principles of the peoples' Earth Charter.
The artists then asked participants to put their hands in paint and print their handprints on small squares of upcycled cloth, dyed with plants near the local river they were celebrating. They then asked participants to choose a symbol of one of the Earth Charter principles that most resonated with them and that symbol was screen printed over their handprint. Strung together, these printed handprints–with the values that matter most to all these people, young and old, were strung around a pilot Future Ancestor festival - like prayer flags for 'the community of life'!
I was startled by how principles for a better world, conflated with handprints on recycled scraps of fabric, moved me! Echoes of humanity's moral evolution from cave handprint times were sensitively made real, meaningful and personal in such humble ways. I can only imagine how activated the values conversations and holistic learning were between generations.
This type of work has a name that I've found from them and their wonderful Greek activist advisor Dr Asta Papachristodoulou - 'visual poetry'. I wish more ecoliterate visual poets, ecological philosophers and values educators were at the table with our leaders as that moves
people's conscience more so than policy, although of course policy is important too.
But something is failing in communications globally, something has been overlooked to reach peoples' hearts.
Thanks again Karen for your posts and your reflections,
from a small thriving wood in rural Ireland here under a wintry sky,
and from many eco-creatives too -as I will be sharing your post above with them for sure :)
PS be great if you could make, or share news about the 25th global celebrations of the Earth Charter, at the Peace Palace in the Hague next July.
Very good!