SongMaps Rye

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SongMaps Rye 2024: mapping change and adaptation in song, poetry and visual arts

This year, with generous support from The Bernard Nevill Estate, we were able to honour the Manifesto for Change that emerged from our 2023 pilot project – click here or scroll down for our account of last year’s pilot project- and devote time to substantial Research and Development to shape the ongoing progress of SongMaps Rye. Our objective is to provide an adaptable template for community engagement and cohesion driven by the arts and sciences. Our aim is to empower vulnerable coastal communities adapting to environmental change, to build networks of support, information and connection and strengthen their resilience.

We assembled a creative team led by our chair, Susan Benn and artistic director Dominique Le Gendre and joined by Brother Chan Phap Lai, administrator of the Bernard Nevill Estate fund and partners from last year’s pilot Lucy Bowyer, environmental educator and conservator and Sheena Morgan, writer and bumblebee conservator. The team welcomed new partners from the freshly revived Tilling Green Residents Association – founder and chair of the association Dan Lake and Graham Ellis, educator, social circus founder and vice-chair of the association.

Together, we have shaped an exciting public programme of multidisciplinary activities and events for 2025, closely linked to existing activities based at the Tilling Green Community Centre. The full SongMaps Rye 2025 public programme includes science and arts workshops for primary schools and young citizen scientists, nature writing workshops, family gardening workshops, music, circus skills and costume making workshops and performance opportunities throughout the year for all participants.

While we await the outcome of two funding bids, we were thrilled to receive news of support from the Chalk Cliff Trust.

Watch this space for progress reports and news of other facets of our SongMaps Rye programme.

The 2023 Project

SongMaps Rye is an innovative pilot programme created by StrongBack Productions and partners Speaking Volumes in collaboration with Rye Harbour Nature Reserve.

The project brought together artists- poets and writers, a composer, a sound artist and a visual artist- scientists, conservationists, a local fisherman, an anthropologist and intergenerational participants, to learn how Rye is being affected by changes due to climate events. Educational talks were followed by artist-led creative workshops and Open Space problem-solving workshops.

The talks, delivered by local experts, citizen- scientists The Strandliners, conservationist Dr. Barry Yates, anthropologist Kate Giles and fisherman Paul Hodges revealed the history of Rye and its constantly shifting nature, as observed, studied and cared for over decades of fishing, creating Rye Harbour Nature Reserve, cleaning and collecting the debris and pollution from the rivers, seas and drains, meticulous data collection and reporting and understanding human interactions with nature and the environment.

“I sit in it like an octopus with multiple arms; all sensors out, alive, active and responding while I continue to peer in amazement at the tremendous commitment demonstrated by a core group of participants and the stupendous team of artists.”

Taking inspiration from the science, natural heritage and conservation of the local area, the creative team led participants in mapping the changes and proposing solutions to address the issues that are most pressing to coastal communities on the front line of climate change and rising seas. Post-workshop, each artist then captured the participants’ responses along with their personal responses to the talks, shaping these into their own songmaps that are presented below.

This experimental programme of collective learning and creativity has allowed us to explore and discover the vital role that the arts can play in communities to facilitate learning, to harness community engagement, to propose creative collective solutions and communicate these effectively and meaningfully as we adapt to climate change.

Find out more by listening below to Ryecast from our Associate Artist James Stewart, here he talks to the artists and participants on the first workshop session of SongMaps Rye.

The Presentation

This series of five workshops culminated with a presentation at Rye Harbour Discovery Centre on Sunday 16th July 2023. This was a celebration of the project and a proposal of how it could be extended and imagined into the future. There was sea shanty singing, sharing of poems, soundscapes, visualisations and walking workshops culminating with a newly commissioned ritualised walk from the nature reserve’s visitor centre to the sea.

James Stewart presented his soundscape The sound of Rye you can listen on Ryecast here

Manifesto Credit: S. Morgan

Postcard Credit: Mo Langmuir

Poet Francesca Beard shared her DIY RYE Talk & Walk. An outcome inspired by the elements that worked so brilliantly during our SongMaps Rye journey – experts sharing local knowledge, open space discussions where everyone’s voice was heard and the transformational power of creativity. It is also a response to the main challenges that we faced – how hard it is to spend time thinking about the climate crisis and how hard it is to reach others within this diverse community.

Research shows that walking and talking together facilitates side by side conversations that are less confrontational and more thoughtful and open than face to face discussions. Meeting in outdoor settings naturally encourages participants to connect with each other and their environment. Programming expert talks and creative activities offers a rich and layered experience which also feels relaxed and inclusive.

Sally Wood presented an newly designed interactive engagement tool in the form of a suitcase. It aims to distil and present the variety of workshops and talks given as part of SongMaps Rye to continue discussion, collect thoughts and data and equip others to run similar workshops themselves.

Antonia Taddei presented a ritualised walk to the beach from the Discovery Centre in small groups with an artist reading from the poem Engagement with the Sea. Complete with eyemask to further engage all the other senses and get us to think about our relationship with the environment even more.

The Experts

We asked our guest speakers to list three things that the ordinary person, of any age can do to make a change and to make a difference.

Dr. Barry Yates

• Find out more about their environment and support environmental charities.
• Reduce their own consumption of food and materials that are damaging to the environment
• Be an advocate for change – influence friends and family

Kate Giles

• Allow yourself to develop a sense of nature connectedness by spending time being present and conscious in it: fall in love and feel loved back.
• Ask yourself “do I really need this or can I find a creative way to be without it”, with everything you might want to buy.
• Find other ways to travel that aren’t flying. Take time to get to places more slowly. Savour the journey.

Paul Hodges

• Use public transportation where possible, particularly those which use an environmentally friendly energy source, such as electrically driven vehicles.
• Reduce domestic consumption of all kinds of energy. A reduction in the use of fossil fuel heating systems, used at home, can help!
• Campaign against governments that aren’t doing enough to protect the environment. Support industries that promote ‘low impact’ energy such as wind power, wave or tidal energy systems which have an extremely low impact on our environment and planet!

The Strandliners

• Avoid single use plastic whenever possible; carry your own cup/shopping bag etc./refuse disposables/buy loose produce or buy in bulk
• Think about food; reduce waste/grow own veg or buy local/compost/eat what is season
• Think about lifestyle and reduce carbon footprint; use public transport, avoid short haul flights, consider energy use, consider the carbon footprint of the things you buy before they even reach you.

The Artists

To read more about their involvement you can find their blogs here

Antonia Taddei
Antonia is the co-director of Xtnt, a Paris-based Art/theatre company that aims to redefine the role of the Performing Arts in contemporary society. Since 1997, Antonia has specialised in designing innovative participatory and multidisciplinary programs for the company. Xtnt was awarded a major commission involving the participation of 900 local inhabitants for Mons 2015, European Capital of Culture. The company’s creation received a prize for its innovative approach from the Department of French Tech Culture and has since been commissioned to create and implement artistic interventions in public spaces all over Europe.

Francesca Beard
Francesca is a published poet and facilitator working with, in and for communities. She runs creative workshops with a range of age groups, from babies and their carers in libraries to people living with dementia in care homes. Partner institutions include Apples and Snakes, Almeida, All Change, BBC, Barbican, the British Council, Tower of London, Hampton Court Palace and The Natural History Museum. She has collaborated with researchers at The British Geological Survey, WikiMedia and Wellcome to produce science informed poems that inspire social change and arts and community activism.

Mo Langmuir
Mo is a multi-disciplinary practitioner using social art to explore being human on a shared planet, broadening traditional Western science and knowledge-making systems to create ecological futures. Informed by a background in environmental biology, her practice foregrounds process. Mo uses open-source citizen science methodologies to research hyper-local ecologies with communities, observing the interconnected nature of the total environment and the multiplicity of source, including landscape, folklore, lived experience, sampling, written word, museology, music, sound. Mo’s artistic practise is rooted in behavioural research to maximise connection and campaign strategy to maximise impact.

Sheena Morgan
S Morgan has written professionally for 30 years, including writing and editing for The Guardian, Red, The Independent, PD, The Daily Telegraph, KV, New Eden and Hello. She is the author of nine books, including The Shingle Shore and editor of a poetry anthology, News Ways of Looking. In 1995 she organised Synergy, a London-based convention where Jungian psychotherapists entered into conversation with practitioners of Shamanism, Druidry and Wicca. The event sought to explore psychotherapy in relation to alternative spirituality. In 2010 she opened Avocet Gallery in Rye Harbour, which, over the last 13 years has led to a fruitful network of connections to local artists, writers and makers.

Sally Wood
Sally is a freelance writer, facilitator and producer. A long-term collaborator with StrongBack Productions, in 2022 she produced “Come On In: Loughborough Farm”, a short film sharing the stories of volunteers at an urban farm through poetry and song. Recently she worked with Ministry of Stories on their escape room project: “The Night The Day Was Broken”. The project was designed by 11-16 year olds and then installed for a month-long run in their workshop space. A mixture of facilitation and operations management the project crossed art forms to be a wonderful celebration of the work of the young people.

Dominique Le Gendre
StrongBack’s Artistic Director and acclaimed composer, Dominique has composed music extensively for theatre, film, dance, art installations, television and radio drama for BBC Radio 3 and 4. She composed and produced music for all 38 Shakespeare plays recorded for the audio collection, The Complete Arkangel Shakespeare directed by Clive Brill. She has composed music and been musical director for Shakespeare’s Globe, StrongBack Productions, Talawa Theatre, London Bubble Theatre, Thirty Birds, Wild Iris, Women’s Theatre Group, Theatre of Black Women, Double Exposure Theatre company, Avon Touring and Theatre Centre. Dominique is a former Associate Artist of the Royal Opera House.

James Stewart
During a 30-year career at the BBC James worked as a presenter and journalist in local radio covering Kent and Sussex before moving to London to work in news and on some of the BBC’s biggest programmes, including Children In Need and Comic Relief. He moved to Rye in 2021 where he now makes podcasts, including the Aria nominated Ryecast which features the stories of people who live and work in Rye.

Photo Credit: KT Bruce

If you would like more information on SongMaps Rye or would be interested in a collaboration to bring SongMaps to your area please contact us at strongbackproductions@gmail.com

This project has been supported by Arts Council England, Rother District Council and The Chalk Cliff Trust.