Halesworth Gallery- information behind the work

The power of plants.

“I remember my childhood names for grasses and secret flowers. I remember where a toad may live and what time the birds awaken in the summer -- and what trees and seasons smelled like (........). The memory of odors is very rich.”
― John Steinbeck, East of Eden ref (3)

The Periwinkle yf 2016

The Periwinkle Plant yf

Here I work on part of an image that depicts the amazing diversity found in the Rainforest....I feel passionate about the inclusion of factual accounts within the work and this on going project ... By incorporating in this case the Periwinkle  - the derivatives within this plant have been found to have medicinal qualities and are being used in forms of childhood Luekemia ...So many plants still yet to be discovered with medicinal qualities.(1)

I am hoping to encourage the viewer to consider the effects upon wildlife, fauna, and indigenous people concerning the felling and burning down of a succession of Rainforests...the arguments for deforestation concerning the use for land in agriculture or cattle seem somewhat perplexing as the soil holds no sustenance and evidence suggests it is barren not fertile therefore once forests are felled the land literally in effect becomes a waste land (2)

In Chico Mendes book "Fight For The Forest" It states due to the millennia of time and the ancient rock masses (being the oldest on earth) the ancient soil is infertile...The expanse of time over which the Rainforest grew on this barren soil is more about the layers of thick dense spongy residues of moss and years of decomposing vegetation - this seems to be what and where the forests nutrition is more dependent on - a continuing process ( paraphrased into own words pg 40 - (3) -the cycle of life
then continues.

Part of Chico Mendes and The Brazil Nut tree, yf

The personal journey of understanding factual information being presented is part of my own development -this project I acknowledge is an on going journey of discovery and learning.

“A thing which I regret, and which I will try to remedy some time, is that I have never in my life planted a walnut. Nobody does plant them nowadays—when you see a walnut it is almost invariably an old tree. If you plant a walnut you are planting it for your grandchildren, and who cares....... for his grandchildren?”
― George Orwell ref (4)

Acknowledgement's :


http://readanddigest.com/the-amazon-a-gigantic-miracle/ (1)
Fight For The Forest- Chico Mendes in his own words, Latin America Bureau (Research and Action) Ltd, 1989 Additional Material Tony Gross
Edited by Duncan Green
Translated by Chris Whitehouse (2-3)
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/memory ref (3 & 4)