Tea and Seed Stories - reflections on WED 2010 in the Japanese Gardens at Mt Coot-tha

World Environment Day event - Mt Coot-tha

This table of seeds, plants and other items was set up by Bettina Palmer, one of the long term Volunteer guides at Brisbane Botanic Gardens to demonstrate the seeds to be found on site at the gardens. Helping also on the day was another wonderful volunteer Judy Grimshaw shown above with a group of visitors.

This was the setting for 'Tea and Seed Stories' at the Japanese Garden

Bettina was my excellent guide earlier this year when I was getting familiar with the Gardens - click on this earlier post to read about the tour she took me on one rainy day in March!

 

This is a close up (click to enlarge for viewing) of the jewellery that Bettina is wearing which is one of her designs. She has specially featured as many seeds or natural items as possible. The large red ones come from Brazil - I will need to ask her for the name of it. 

Below: are a series of items that were on the table primarily to engage children in the task of connecting seeds to the related food items. However being a Sunday many passers by stopped at this table and all eyes were on the pomegranate, cacao beans and chocolate, coffee beans and lotus pods in particular. I did a post on the cacao bean (seed actually) here in March as well. You can see it growing in the Geodesic Dome for Tropical plants.

  

In the centre of the table you may see the chocolate next to the cacao beans which are encase in a  white, furry substance.

banksia seedpods and blackbean seeds - I spy other seeds but can identify them from here.

bunya nuts and coffee beans

macadamias with biscuits made from them.

Bettina also kept many children very busy with paper and textas drawing the seeds on display whilst some parents joined me in the Japanese Tea House for the story circle dialogue. She had a seriously busy day along with Judy and I am very grateful for their time on Sunday. These two gorgeous sisters didn't mind sharing their work with us.

Below are a series of shots from the tea house in the break between sessions. We had a well attended early session and also later session - so numbers were ripe for good conversation and the telling of stories. A number of people have commented since on the fact we had an extraordinarily diverse crowd - diverse in backgrounds - cultural, professional and community-wise. This lead to very interesting cross-connections on the day and the enthusiasm by many to do something like this again!

We had a magnificent day all round - with lovely mild temperatures, sunshine and an outlook that was blissful. We could see some passers by looking quite longingly at our gathering in this tea house.

And quite a few impromptu visitors joined us which was lovely as we had put our posters around so it would be known new-comers were welcome to participate.

The story circle was an ideal way to meet new people and be briefly introduced to each others stories, the thinking behind them, and where we have come from. Each person was given this introduction below and the reference to the UN fact sheet on Biodiversity. Read this May blog post to see more.

You are invited to come along on June 6 to the Japanese Garden for tea and seed stories in honour of World Environment Day - celebrating Biodiversity

Please click to enlarge for more information - you will see the contact details on the bottom left corner. This part of the garden is truly delightful and there are actually formal Japanese Tea Ceremonies held there from time to time. I will posts images of this garden soon so if you can come along that will be especially wonderful!

Children will be kept busy with special art activites and there will be two sessions for the story circle so bring a picnic if you like and definitely find those seeds you've been saving, or pods or just a story to tell.

I'm taking bookings even though is is definitely a free event as we would love to have an idea of numbers. If you come along at the last minute dont worry - we will try and squeeze you in...
Tea will be something fresh and herbal on this occasion ... but as we are celebrating Biodiversity you may wish to bring something you have grown that would make a lovely tea. And why not bring a prized cup if you would like....there'll be a story there!

If you would like to read the United Nations Secretary Generals message for WORLD ENVIRONMENT DAY  or   WED 2010  I'm adding it below and it is also to be found here.

United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon

Biodiversity, the incredible variety of life on Earth that sustains us, is in peril. Species are becoming extinct at the fastest rate ever recorded. Most of these extinctions are tied to human activities that are polluting and depleting water resources, changing and degrading habitats and altering the global climate. From frogs to gorillas, from huge plants to tiny insects, thousands of species are in jeopardy.

The theme of this year’s World Environment Day, “Many Species. One Planet. One Future”, echoes the call of the International Year of Biodiversity to stop this mass extinction and raise awareness about the vital importance of the millions of species that inhabit our planet’s soils, forests, oceans, coral reefs and mountains. Our health, well-being and sustainable future depend on this intricate, delicate web of ecosystems and life.

The global host of the 2010 WED celebration is Rwanda. This small country in the Great Lakes region of Africa is rapidly earning a reputation as a green pioneer. Home to 52 threatened species, including the rare mountain gorilla, Rwanda is showing how environmental sustainability can be woven into the fabric of a country’s economic growth. Despite its many challenges, including poverty and widespread land degradation, the “land of a thousand hills” is working to reforest, embrace renewable energies, pursue sustainable agriculture and develop a green vision for the future.

This year, Kigali will be the heartbeat of a global, multicultural, intergenerational celebration of our planet, its millions of species and the countless ways in which life on Earth is interconnected. On World Environment Day, I appeal to everyone – from Kigali to Canberra, from Kuala Lumpur to Quito – to help us sound the alarm. Get involved, speak out. Learn and teach others. Show leadership and help clean up. Reconnect with nature, our life force. Together, we can develop a new vision for biodiversity: Many Species. One Planet. One Future.

click  BIODIVERSITY FACT SHEET: or click on each item to enlarge these pages below to read properly! ASIDE: Can I just say on a personal note that this is to date the most appealingly conceived, intelligently written and concise overview I've come across on Biodiversity for the general reader -

What is Biodiversity? 

Come 

 with us 

  on 

      a journey

WAYS OF SEEING - a visit to dear ada

       In the previous post I referred to the fact there are a great many approaches to Botanical subject matter in the Visual Arts. In the field of Scientific Botanical Illustration there is and no doubt always will be variation and invention, even in this most classical of arenas.
Ways of seeing indeed!
I thought I would highlight the curious and imagination directions of some artists working with botanical subjects in this post. However, I am going to start with several simple drawings from the children who came to my studio last year by way of introduction to / immersion in the multi-dimensional world where art meets botany.

The first work is by 7 year old Tom - perhaps worth clicking to enlarge this image - Tom was asked to draw something he liked and he jumped up and ran to the garden and came back with these camellias and nasturtium and a shell. I was intrigued to observe the careful layout of items that preoccupied him for a time then the extraordinary series of little texta images he created on the top right hand side of the page. He was totally engaged and only at the end did he look up, grow concerned and proceed to apologise for the smallness of the drawings, not that I was bothered by this. When it was time to go home he carefully carried the entire arrangement with drawing home as is here - his mother realising it was quite precious to him made sure it arrived home safely.
This entire procedure really fascinated me and it struck me that there was something quite powerful in this ritual that all of us could learn from. To see the deep absorbtion and the importance of composition, the artfulness in that alone was affecting.

Here in 12 year old Phoebe's work she collected leaves outside then observed and recorded the unique colours and features with care, painting each individually in a small notebook before the final invention - pasting them on a single stalk. On the one hand a simple process, but in another way, I saw her really take her time to appreciate the uniqueness of what she was looking at ... and I liked the whimsical and perhaps nonsensical twist at the end. It effectively draws attention to the uniqueness of each -  a curious way of completing her work.


Now I am taking you to the weblog Dear Ada (click on title to open) for a quick viewing of artists listed under botanical - garden in her categories. I would like to give the links to each individual artist here but that would take hours... so do visit the Dear Ada botanical link I have provided above and when you are free to trawl take a look at the links to the various artists. Apologies for not providing the details for wach artist here. The list starts with the extraordinarily talented Australian artist Fiona Hall and takes you to different parts of the globe, mediums and processes and styles of working. I hope you are intrigued and delighted as much as I was to survey the enormous variety in ways of seeing.


1. Fiona Hall



2. Ruth Van Haren Noman



3. Ellen Goldschmidt



4. Qiang Huang



5. Bill Beckley

6.  John Baird

7. Sonnenschein Eliezer

8. Neil Jones

9. David Hockney

10. Hugo Guinness

11. Not Known or identified

12.  Joyce Tennyson

13. Dam and Karislund Glas

14.  Maarten Kolk

15.  Linda Broadfoot

16. Malin Bjorklund

17. Scrapbook Floriegium

18. Daniel Williams



19.  Pamela Di Mauro

20.  Benjamin Long

21.  Dirk Mueggenburg



22. Gustav Oskar Andersson malme



23.  David Pearson

24. Karl Blossfeldt



25. Olga Seem



26.alain gerard clement



27.  Chris Hellman



28. Ric Heitzman



29. Becky Suss



30.  Alice Stevenson



31. Judy Pfaff



32. Julie Blyfield



33.  Allan Ballie



34. Nancy Blum



35. Anna Atkins



36.  Rudolf Blaschka



37. Camilla Penti



38. Jennifer Scott



39. John Buck



40.  Ernest Ciavano 



41.Ninagawa Mika

 I think you will agree this is an extraordinary range of works... and yet just the tip of the iceberg so to speak.  Thanks to Dear Ada for the peek into this fabulous array of wonderful artists and their work.