Two notable additions to the programme on Sat 27th Sept at Essex Business School
Justin Hopper is an American writer based in Britain. His work explores the intersection of landscape, memory and myth. His site-specific audio poetry works have been commissioned by arts organisations and festivals in the US and UK. For Wood Street Galleries in the US, Hopper has curated a decade-long series of contemporary landscape-art exhibitions. His most recent release, the 2019 spoken-word and music album Chanctonbury Rings from Ghost Box Records, was called “an album of sensual spellcraft” by Caught by the River. His live show, the Great Satanic Swindle, is currently touring based on a true story located in a Sussex village in 1980.
We will also host an exhibit of Colchester’s newest (and most amazing) community green space, The Beth Chatto Meanwhile Garden.
David Gates from Beth Chatto will be attending to discuss how the Meanwhile Garden has transformed an unused brownfield site alongside the Firstsite Art Gallery, which has been abandoned and unused since 2012. Planted on top of unused rubble and tarmac, the garden has been deliberately designed for both ornamental and spontaneous wild plants- a unique combination providing a rich offering for insects.
The site is owned by Essex County Council and the license to put in the garden was acquired by Beth Chatto’s on the understanding that it be returned to ECC should they have another use for it, hence the term ‘meanwhile’.
The idea of planting this site was originally suggested by then Councillor Pam Cox in 2023-now Colchester’s MP. No public funding was available, so a collaboration with businesses and community groups seemed a way forward.
The Beth Chatto team, along with the Education Trust, took up the challenge, employing Darryl Moore who specialises in urban garden design, to assist with the design element and co-ordinating the project delivery.