An artist's perspective on getting closer to nature through the Birds on the Edge Project - a blog written by Bridget Bailey.
I’m one of nine artists taking part in the Birds on the Edge exhibition at the Inspired by… Gallery at Danby Lodge National Park Centre, open until 8 September. It's part of a project made possible by the National Lottery Heritage Fund and led by the North York Moors Trust.
Working on this project has been a hands-on opportunity to see how tourism, agriculture and conservation co-habit in the National Park and how all the teams work to reach different communities, encouraging people to visit and engage with nature. It's been fascinating for me as an artist to see all this in action and to learn about nature and conservation from experts. The experience has changed and enriched my ideas and inspired me to think more creatively about sharing my passion for getting closer to nature through art and making.
An outdoor conversation about conservation with wind, rain and snow on a chilly day in April made me 'feel' what it might be like to be a bird. We were visiting one of the project’s conservation sites and talking about how ‘the north’ has many more tiny insects, and long daylight hours in summer, so chicks grow and fledge much faster than they would nearer the equator. Turtle doves are coming here from Spain, some adventurous robins are going to Sweden for the summer, so the massive effort of migration is mostly worth it…
The site we visited was prepared especially for turtle doves. They're very shy and particular about food and environment. They nest in such dense thickets that you never see one. The female turtle dove never calls and the male only a little, so even gaging whether the numbers are increasing is a challenge. When they drink, they like a gravelly beach to walk down and they only eat tiny seeds from meadow plants including common vetch, bird’s-foot trefoil, black medick, and fumitory.
I came away with better understanding of how conservation actually works - making the right habitat by researching what has worked in other places and doing that in good faith that the birds will come. It’s time-consuming work, often not many birds are visible and chicks and eggs are so vulnerable that most nests are always hidden away, whatever the bird. It's thinking about all the fascinating things I learnt about the secret lives of birds that we can't see that became the inspiration for my piece.
What unseen aspects of nature might an artwork bring into view?
Birds are a wonderful inspiration for ingenious making and sustainability, using the materials in their habitat - from stems of last year’s flowers, to cat fluff, or wood shavings - and their nests are real samples of the human activities and flora and fauna of a particular place. Inspired by this I made 'Nestscape', a nest that represents the change of the seasons and the flora and fauna of the landscape - a nudge to remember that a little dry stem was once flowering and imagine what a nest might look like if all the plant fibres in it started to grow again.
In the spirit of birds using what’s around them, this nest was made from materials commonly found in a milliner's natural habitat. I made hats for many years and my studio is full of dyed abaca fibre, millinery straw, wire, organza and velvet.
These materials I know and love make their own suggestions, velvet with a thread of feather wound around it makes a furry caterpillar. And a feather found while out walking reminds me of the place it came from when I snip it to make a delicate seed-head.
Making things adds a more physical experience to engaging with nature, just as being out in the weather got me imagining the lives of birds in wind and rain on the study day in April.
The aim of this project is to support people and nature to thrive together and it's been been inspiring be see how North York Moors Trust and partners are doing this, giving many young people their first experience of connecting with nature through conservation and creative sessions.
