Connecting with the local community with the coastal landscape of Norfolk by Genevieve Rudd.
This year is the National Year of the Coast, so it feels extra exciting for us to be leading our coastal nature-connection activity at Under Open Sky in 2023. I founded Under Open Sky as a not-for-profit organisation in late 2021, after a decade of leading community arts projects as a freelancer. We’re based in Great Yarmouth and work along the Norfolk/Suffolk coast. The organisation is supported by co-directors Kate Harper and Sasha Pinto, alongside practitioners and facilitators who bring their skills into our projects. Kate is a PhD student with interests in sustainability, fashion cultures and circular economies and Sasha is a conservation scientist and beach warden. At Under Open Sky, we use creative arts, science, wellbeing and heritage approaches to connecting with the coastal landscape, informed by the Earth crisis and the many ways our coastline is changing. We celebrate the varied relationships and perspectives of our blue spaces through our community engagement projects, which are predominantly aimed at adults, especially those who face the biggest barriers to accessing the natural world.
We’ve been leading our Coasters coastal nature-connection programme in Spring and Summer this year with support from Sea-Changers, The Timothy Coleman Charitable Trust and Natural England’s Year of the Coast funding strand from Defra. We piloted the Coasters programme last year with 12 local adults, and found that our participants loved the chilled out spirit of our sessions and the variety of activities. Our pilot programme included people referred from local charities supporting those experiencing mental ill health, homelessness and social isolation, alongside self-referrals. It’s important that Coasters – like our other programmes – feels like an inclusive space for all to take part in acts of sea care as acts of self-care. FoFoun
Our Coasters programme is informed by nature-connection research into how people build lasting relationships with the natural world. This includes a focus on celebrating moments of awe, connecting with the emotions and senses, taking part in practical steps to look after a landscape, and moving beyond wildlife knowledge acquisition (such as learning all the names of a species) into appreciating the joy they evoke.
We’ve been delighted to be back at our project base – the Marina Centre, Great Yarmouth – with our Coasters programme for sessions between February and June this year. Our Coasters participants have told us: Our Coasters participants have previously said:
- “Another great day on the beach, I found it really interesting just being part of the elements of the ecosystem, absolutely love it!”
- “I found it calming and peaceful. Very interesting to look into my mind like I haven’t before and see the sea differently”
- “A wonderful opportunity to consider the nature of the sea, to interact and relate to it, to breathe with it and allow it to inspire”
Later in the year, we hope to be working with academic researchers to deeper explore our relationships to the coast. Our research proposal, The Sea and Me, has been shorted by the Centre for Cultural Value’s Collaborate fund and we’ll find out very soon whether we’ve been successful! This programme links up 10 UK-wide cultural projects with research partners to use rigorous methodologies to explore a subject, contributing to the body of knowledge of how culture impacts people’s lives. This year, we’ll be exploring what it means to exist ‘on the (coastal) edge’ and how our lives, identities and outlook is impacted by the sea, especially at this time of rapid coastal change. Whilst we’re still in the early stages of the scheme, we anticipate there will be opportunities for local people in the Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft areas to get actively involved and share their stories.
We have lots of activity happening behind the scenes, spurred on by the National Year of the Coast momentum! In the pipeline – supported by funding from the Postcode Places Trust – we’re developing new programmes to help us connect with more local folks. This will include our Vitamin Sea corporate programme: more than just a work away day, this will be essential time to restore and connect to the coastal landscape, your colleagues and yourself. By offering programmes like this, it will help us bring in vital income to support our work with marginalised communities. If you’d like to be part of this programme, to trial the experience to support its development, get in touch via email: genevieve@underopensky.co.uk
Under Open Sky is a 100% not-for-profit organisation, operating for a social purpose. This means that all of our work has community impact at its core. Our aim is to connect communities with their local coastal spaces, through multidisciplinary events and projects. We support people to nurture relationships with the environment to benefit their health and wellbeing and, in turn, feel more confident to adapt and respond to the climate and ecological emergency.
If you’d like to support our work, we have a number of ways you can make a contribution:
- Donate to us on Ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/underopenskyltd
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- Sponsor an item on our wish list: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1DC2vI6UsPj3my1YBEPxOdW2SVoVMSG2OMzrPk2hSMuE/edit?usp=sharing
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You can follow our work at Under Open Sky on social media: @UnderOpenSkyLtd on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
