NOTES FROM THE WORKSHOP | MAY
Remember that time in lockdown when we rediscovered birdsong?
When during a time of uncertainty and confusion that completely upturned our reality, we stopped to notice something simple and pure. And it was so much more poignant than before.
The beauty was in the contrast.
And you don't always have to define or understand it, you can just feel it.
This is something that came up in my conversation with ceramicist Isatu Hyde. How leaning into the space between opposites - light and heavy, hard and soft - can reveal a true connection.
This is why I love Isa's work so much. It makes me feel something without being able to pinpoint exactly why. It was a pleasure to get the chance to ask her about it. I hope you enjoy her insights as much as I did.
With love from Argal Home Farm,
Ali x
What’s inspired us this month
Ancient knowledge of a delicate living system
Aluna (2012): The leaders of an ancient hidden civilisation want to show mankind how to avoid destroying the planet. The Kogi people are an indigenous group residing in northern Colombia, in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta mountains. In partnership with The Tairona Heritage Trust, they have made this amazing documentary to help us understand how to avoid the destruction of the world that they are trying to protect, and of ourselves.
Thanks to the Kogi people and film producers vision for the message to reach as many people as possible, Aluna is available to watch in full online for free.
'listen to the silence inside the illusion of the world, and you will remember the lesson you forgot'
An extract from The Portable Jack Kerouac by American novelist and poet Jack Kerouac, a pioneer of the Beat Generation ‘The Beatniks’, a literary subculture movement that began in the 1950’s:
“I have lots of things to teach you now, in case we ever meet, concerning the message that was transmitted to me under a pine tree in North Carolina on a cold winter moonlit night. It said that Nothing Ever Happened, so don't worry. It's all like a dream. Everything is ecstasy, inside. We just don't know it because of our thinking-minds. But in our true blissful essence of mind is known that everything is alright forever and forever and forever. Close your eyes, let your hands and nerve-ends drop, stop breathing for 3 seconds, listen to the silence inside the illusion of the world, and you will remember the lesson you forgot, which was taught in immense milky way soft cloud innumerable worlds long ago and not even at all. It is all one vast awakened thing. I call it the golden eternity. It is perfect. We were never really born, we will never really die. It has nothing to do with the imaginary idea of a personal self, other selves, many selves everywhere: Self is only an idea, a mortal idea. That which passes into everything is one thing. It's a dream already ended. There's nothing to be afraid of and nothing to be glad about. I know this from staring at mountains months on end. They never show any expression, they are like empty space. Do you think the emptiness of space will ever crumble away? Mountains will crumble, but the emptiness of space, which is the one universal essence of mind, the vast awakenerhood, empty and awake, will never crumble away because it was never born.”
Your nearest authentic sauna experience
A directory for sea, lake or river experiences. The British Sauna Society has been championing sauna culture since 2014 and has kindly compiled their own online directory of public and pop-up saunas to make it easy to locate the nearest one to you.
Claiming health benefits that include detoxification, increased metabolism, pain reduction, improved sleep, stress management and relaxation (to name just a handful) saunas are more than just a spa experience and in some cultures, such as their birthplace in Finland, are considered a sacred space – a 'church of nature'. ‘Sauna’ is the only Finnish word in the English dictionary; it means "bath" and "bathhouse."
(Image of Haeckels' Margate bathing machine)
Figures in a Landscape
An extract from the BFI archives - Barbara Hepworth narrated by Cecil Day Lewis.
Figures in a Landscape (1953): a charming 17-minute technicolour documentary featuring rare footage of English artist and sculptor Dame Barbara Hepworth in and around her studio in St Ives, Cornwall. A mesmerising and amusing watch, innovative camera movement for the time explores the shapes of Barbara’s infamous sculptures against the backdrop of the Cornish landscape, paired with narration by Cecil Day Lewis paired and a score by Priaulx Rainier.
Transforming invasive, sewage scented seaweed into building blocks
'When I look at Sargablock, it’s like looking in a mirror....when you have problems with drugs or alcohol, you’re viewed as a problem for society. No one wants anything to do with you. They look away.”
Building houses that could last 120 years using bricks crafted from 40% seaweed and 60% other organic materials, Sargablock was founded by Omar Vázquez Sánchez in 2015. He is now fondly known as Señor Sargazo or Mr. Sargassum. Omar utilises unsightly and unwanted sargassum seaweed that washes up in huge quantities across shorelines from Mexico to Caribbean islands and now more recently, along the beaches of Florida’s east coast. A result of climate change, pollution and fertilizer use researchers say.
Much like how Vivobarefoot have created their own line of innovative algae bloom footwear, Omar saw opportunity where others see a nuisance, and since founding his company has built over 13 houses for low-income families using the ‘smelly seaweed’.
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