BARK FESTIVAL

Charlie Waite

The internationally acclaimed landscape photographer and author Charlie Waite, who lives in Dorset, will give an illustrated talk about his approach to taking photographs of landscapes and trees to launch and raise funds for the festival.

7.30pm. Tickets £10, £7 SAC Members, U18s £4

Shaftesbury’s Significant Trees

A walk with Dominic Gane, North Dorset District Council’s Tree Officer. 11.00am. Meet outside Shaftesbury Guild Hall in the High Street. Free event.

Photo - Karen Green

Fascination with Trees

A visual art exhibition curated by Peter Ursem.

Charlie Baird,  Joan Haig, Richard Hoare, Isabel Mullery Peter Ursem

This exhibition shows work of five Shaftesbury artists of international standing, all of whom have in their work revisited the secret world of trees time and time again to be embraced by our giant overlookers.

Charlie Baird’s vivid paintings locate dreams in the landscape. His recent series ‘Endangered Species’ is a powerful cry in a world at risk of losing our natural habitat.

Joan Haig is a see-er who has painted trees all her life, capturing their light and movement in subtle tones.

Light is also a key motif in Richard Hoare’s paintings and prints. A keen traveller, Richard has observed trees from green England to the far south, in the morning dawn, the scorching sun and the moonlit night.

Isabel Mullery works with paper, collage and embroidery. She has been looking at the shapes of branches and the spaces between them. As an art teacher at Shaftesbury school, she has worked with her pupils towards the BARK! festival during the last year.

In many of the woodcuts and paintings of Dutch artist Peter Ursem trees take centre stage, as characters in a story. Peter is fascinated by trees as personalities, and by their compositional potential on canvas.

The Gallery: Monday 13 to Saturday 25 April. Open every day 10.00 - 4.30

Peter Ursem

Richard Hoare

Tree and Landscape Photography

by Charlie Waite

An exhibition of the works of one of the world’s leading landscape photographers who has always been inspired and captivated by light.

Phoenix Room: 10.00 - 4.30

Charlie Waite

Shaftesbury’s Trees in old and new photographs

Photos supplied by Shaftesbury Museum taken in the early 1900s by A. E. Tyler with Bill Purnell’s photos of the same locations in the 1980s that include prominent trees re-taken by members of the Shaftesbury Camera Club in 2008.

Upstairs in Shaftesbury Arts Centre.

Woodturning by Steve Pocock

Steve Pocock specialises in bespoke pieces from bowls to chess sets, turned from native hardwoods.

Upstairs in the Shaftesbury Arts Centre.

Turnbull’s Delicatessen & Café

Rachel Sargent & Catherine Simmonds

Rachel Sargent (painter) and Catherine Simmonds (poet) team up for BARK! to explore the miraculous chemical and visual metamorphosis of light that makes the trees we know and love. Taking the beech tree as their subject, Rachel will work with photopolymer or solar plates, which enable both images and text to be established on a photosensitive surface via exposure of light. Through this process Rachel’s paintings and Catherine’s poetry can be combined.

An exhibition of this work will be on show in the Conservatory between April 13th and 25th.

On Thursday April 16th there is a chance to view the work with cheese, wine and a reading between 6.30 and 7.30pm.

Rachel Sargent

The Salt Cellar

'Treescapes' by Dave Martin

Dorset resident Dave Martin (aka ‘A Man in a Hat’) is a professional photographer who takes his inspiration from the beauty and form in nature.

He applies methods and values of traditional photography within the greatly flexible digital format, showing that art and science can be combined to great effect.

Dave Martin

Turnbulls Delicatessen & Café

Participatory Poetry Wall

Write a poem (or short prose) about a tree, woods, forests or trees in general, (possibly about your own favourite) to be displayed on the Participatory Poetry Wall at Turnbull’s Delicatessen during the BARK! Festival.

POETRY & PROSE PARTICIPATION PLEASE!

We want you to play an important part in your and others' enjoyment of the BARK! Festival. How? Simply by sharing your thoughts about a tree or trees by writing a poem or short piece of prose.

What we want you to do is to write a poem or a short piece of prose that expresses your very own personal feelings about a tree or a group of trees - or even a wood or a forest. If you are writing about a tree or trees in Shaftesbury please add the location so that others may visit your tree during the BARK! Festival.

Your work must fit on one side of A4 paper only and by entering you agree that your work can be displayed at Turnbull's Café & Delicatessen in Shaftesbury until the end of the festival for customers to read, share, enjoy and discuss.

All work MUST be your own with your name on the front side and your contact details on the back. You may submit as many pieces of your work as you wish. You don't have to be a local to take part!

Please deliver your poem or prose to Turnbull's Café & Delicatessen at 9 High Street, Shaftesbury or Swans Trust Community Resource Centre in Swans Yard, Shaftesbury. (e-mails will only be accepted if sent to shaftesburytreegroup@hotmail.co.uk)

Please keep a copy of your work as submissions will not be returned.

Peter Ursem, ‘The Yew Speaks’

Westminster Memorial Hospital - Shaftesbury School Pupils’ Art Exhibition

All Year 7 students have been exploring Shaftesbury’s trees through words and pictures in their English and art lessons. They have written poems and have combined these with images to create artworks that will be shown at the hospital.

Tim Laycock

A musical and magical celebration of trees and woods in folksong, traditional stories and dialect poetry of Wessex.

Folksinger, songwriter, actor and creator of The New Scorpion Band, Tim is a specialist in the songs, traditions and dialect of the West Country and the poetry and prose of William Barnes and Thomas Hardy.

7.30 Tickets £9.50, £7.50 SAC Members, U18s £4

Film: The Tree of the Wooden Clogs (12)

A film directed by Ermanno Olmi, 1978, with subtitles.

Described as ‘a cinematicmiracle’ and winner of the Palme D’Or at Cannes in 1978, this film charts the story of the hard life of peasants amongst the beautiful landscapes of Lombardy at the turn of the19th/20th centuries.

8.00 -11.10pm  Tickets £5 SAC members £4

A Saint’s Rod at Stockwood and other tree Legends of the West

A talk by Jeremy Harte.

Jeremy is a researcher into the overlap between folklore and archaeology, with a particular interest in sacred space, tales of encounters with the supernatural, and the traditions of Dorset, where he grew up.

His books include ‘Cuckoo Pounds and Singing Barrows’, ‘The Green Man’ and ‘Explore Fairy Traditions’.

7.30pm  Tickets £8.00, £6.00 SAC Members, U18s £4

Woodland, Wild life and sustainable use of Timber

WOOD WORKS

Saturday 18th April – Sunday 19th April

Guildhall, High Street, Shaftesbury

Let's make woods work for us and for nature - meet experts – get advice – find courses – see greenwood artifacts being made. Displays, advice on the sustainable use of timber and conservation, hurdle making, wood turning, carving, basket making.

Common Ground, Cranborne Chase & West Wiltshire Downs AONB, Dorset AONB, Dorset Centre for Rural Skills, Dorset Coppice Group, Dorset Greenwood Tree Project, Dorset Wildlife Trust, Dorset Woodlink, North Dorset District Council Tree Officer, Shaftesbury Tree Group, South Somerset District Council Tree Planting Project Officer, Woodland Trust, Butterfly Conservation (Dorset Branch)

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Coppice Group members include: Paul and Caroline Boak (wood carving & walking sticks), Alexander Huxley (walking sticks), Nick Baxter, Rachel Hugget (woodcarving), Peter Moors (rustic furniture/hurdles), Catherine Pratley (willow baskets/coffins), Peter & Jill Snelson (woodcrafts), Mandy Staple (pyrographed wooden items), Peter Thomas (walking sticks), Mike & Vicki Woodbridge (woodturners).

Saturday 18th 10.00- 4.00 - Sunday 19th 11.00- 3.00

Trees, Woods & the Green Man - An illustrated talk by Sue Clifford.

Sue is a director of Common Ground, the national arts and environment charity, now based in Shaftesbury.

She is also a founder member of the Shaftesbury Tree Group. Sue will give an illustrated talk that explores our natural and cultural relationship with trees and woods.

and

Ancient Trees of North Dorset - An illustrated talk by Sean Cooch.

Sean is a Land Management Conservation Advisor with Natural England in Dorset, specialising in habitat restoration andmanagement, ancient trees and invertebrates.

7.30   Tickets £8, SAC Members £6, U18s £4

SAC Music and Drama presents: The Forest is a Long Time Growing

An evening of readings poetry, prose and music inspired by trees and woods.

Abbey Primary School choir sing Tree Music, songs written by Abbey Primary School pupils with composer Karen Wimhurst. Display of tree foliage arrangements by the Shaftesbury Flower Arranging Group.

7.30   Tickets £7, SAC Members £5, U18’s £3.00.

Films: Ivan’s Childhood (12)  and  The Man Who Planted Trees (NC)

‘Ivan’s Childhood’ (‘Ivanovo detstvo’) was directed by Andrei Tarkovsky in 1962 and based on the novel by Vladimir Bogomolov. It explores a 12 year old’s spying missions among the eerie forests behind enemy lines in WW2.

Subtitles, 95 mins.

‘The Man Who Planted Trees’ (‘L’Homme qui plantait des arbres’) is a short animated film by Frederick Back, 1987, based on Jean Giono’s famous book about one man’s quest to reforest a denuded valley. 30mins.

8.00-10.15   Tickets £5, SAC Members £4.

Beechcombings: The Narratives of Trees

A talk by Richard Mabey.

Richard is Britain’s greatest living nature writer. Author of ‘Food for Free’, ‘Flora Britannica’ and ‘Nature Cure’, his latest book, ‘Beechcombings: The Narratives of Trees’ elegantly challenges our perception of trees.

7.30 Tickets £12, £10 SAC Members, U18s £5

Huckleberry’s Bookshop in Blandford Forum will be setting up a stall to sell Beechcombings and other books by Richard Mabey and other BARK! authors.

Richard will be available for book signings.

Duncliffe Wood

A walk with with Robin Walter, Woodland Trust. See the bluebells and other wild flowers at their best.

11.00  Meet at the entrance by the road from New Lane.

Grid ref: ST817223.

Free (donations to the Woodland Trust).

Ciderland

A talk by James Crowden.

James is an author and poet who lived in and worked near Shaftesbury as a shepherd and sheep shearer for many years.

James’s latest book, ‘Ciderland’ charts the development of cider-making in the West Country and takes us around the beautiful and fragmented orchards. It includes conversations with and descriptions of over 120 cider and perry producers in the West Country. It also covers cider and health, folklore, superstitions and down to earth remedies, placing cider very firmly at the centre ofWest Country culture. Plus 10minute film‘The Cider Drinkers’ and cider tastings with local cheeses fromTurnbull’s Delicatessen in the interval.

7.30   Tickets £8, £6 SAC Members, U18s £4

Many thanks to Blackmore, Cranborne Chase &WestWiltshire Downs AONB, Dorset AONB, North Dorset District Council and Shaftesbury Town Council for their financial support; Charlie Waite for his fundraising talk, and for donating his fees to the BARK! festival and Sue Clifford & Sean Cooch for doing likewise; Darren Giddings for designing this programme and Dave Martin for designing our website.

The BARK! Team: Eric Bailey, Sue Clifford, Tamara Essex, Barry Freeman, Angela King, Paul Schilling, Peter Ursem and others.