This is a six-week period of research in the World Soil Museum, Wageningen, The Netherlands.
Welcome to join these events and keep following online!
Workshop 5 April @ 13.30 – 15.30h
Peat is a precious wetland soil that is hard to preserve. Artist Kate Foster has been at work finding out about the samples in the World Soil Museum.
What kinds of stories can these peatland samples tell? Kate will introduce you to how she looks at the ‘monoliths’ (samples) through her art practice and advocacy work. This is a chance to let your imagination loose within the unique setting of the World Soil Museum. You will be offered a chance to think about how these soils matter in a creative way and choose a theme to work on through drawing and collage.
To register, email Kate at art@meansealevel.net
The World Soil Museum is in the Gaia (Building 101) on the Wageningen Campus: Droevendaalsesteeg 3, 6708 PB
Art, Archaeology and Peat Event
Thursday April 11 @ 19.30 -21.00h
This is with Uitwaaien and dr. Roy van Beek (Environmental Archaeologist)
How can ‘boggy’ ground challenge preconceptions?
Welcome to a conversation where science and art meet to link natural and cultural heritage!
Just turn up at the Speakers Corner at Stippeneng 2, 6708 WE Wageningen (WUR Building 115)
Further information
How can science and art help widen views of wetland landscapes?
Welcome to take part in a conversation with Kate Foster (environmental artist) and Roy van Beek (environmental archaeologist) where science and art meet to link natural and cultural heritage!
Bring your curiosity to explore preconceptions: we invite you to get ‘swamped’ and find new ways through ‘boggy’ ground!
The speakers will introduce how they work towards new perspectives:- Roy van Beek regarding the presentation and interpretation of archaeological finds and Kate Foster making art where the context ‘is half the work.
Peatlands are special inland wetlands whose precious natural and cultural heritages urgently needs protection. Kate Foster and Roy van Beek met in 2020 through their respective work on Dutch and Scottish peatlands linking natural and cultural heritage. They will share vignettes from their projects to prompt discussion about story-making in these landscapes.
Biographies
Kate Foster is an environmental artist working in Scotland and the Netherlands. A background in social science (PhD) steered her towards interdisciplinary work and several art-environment collaborations. Since 2016, her artist-led project Peat Cultures has grown in grassroots as well as research and museum settings in Wageningen. This event with Uitwaaien arises from her current creative investigation of peat samples in the World Soil Museum, Wageningen (Peatland Figures).
Roy van Beek is Associate Professor in Landscape Archaeology at Wageningen University and Research. His work on wetlands includes leading the Home Turf Project, an integrated approach to the long-term development, cultural connections and heritage management of Dutch raised bogs (Wageningen University & Research), funded by the Dutch Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO). He also led the Dutch work with Wetfutures (Wetland Futures in Contested Environments) – an inter- and transdisciplinary approach to wetland heritage in the Netherlands, United Kingdom and Ireland.
peat cultures 