This April 2024, over 3 different panels and workshops, we’ll be looking at the intersection of climate and Creative Health. Many of us may already know that time in nature is beneficial towards our mental and physical health but how does the climate crisis, access to nature and our own nature come into this?
On the 17th April members were invited to engage in a really special Creative Health Sandpit panel with guest speakers exploring the intersections of their creative practice, nature practices all within the setting of living and working in London.
The panel was hosted by Alys Pearce from Action, Movement Peace.
About the Speakers:
Chantelle Lindsay
Chantelle Lindsay is a Wildlife Conservationist and Presenter. She currently works as London Wildlife Trust’s ‘Nature in Mind’ project coordinator, delivering a programme of nature-based wellbeing sessions to young people on the waiting list for Newham’s Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service, in partnership with NHS. She has been in love with the natural world ever since she can remember, which led her to a career in the environmental sector. She is co-host of CBeebies’ ‘Chantelle and Rory’s Teeny Tiny Creatures’, teaching children about the U.K.’s smallest animals and encouraging children to look after our planet. She has featured on various programmes such as Blue Peter and Springwatch, and toured with the CBeebies’ BBC Prom: Ocean Adventure. Chantelle believes in making nature accessible and inclusive to all and aspires to make positive change within the environmental sector and beyond, aiming to be a source of Love and force for Good.
Kewisa AKA City Girl in Nature
Kwesia grew up in Deptford, an inner city area of South-East London. Along with many of her friends, neighbors and peers, who all experienced a great deal of the challenges that come with living in an area, and with people, who have often been neglected, excluded and marginalized. She struggled a great deal with making sense of senseless violence and trauma, she had faced, she found herself homeless, moving from sofa to sofa, and struggling with her mental health and well-being. Her life was chaotic, often harsh, without meaning or any sense of direction or purpose. At her lowest, she received what could be regarded as a gift and a blessing. An opportunity to be part of a British Exploring Society’s expedition to the Peruvian Amazon Rain-forest. She spent 3 weeks in a remote part of the jungle, with no phone or contact with the outside world, with a group of people that she barely knew. This, in many ways, was a life-changing experience for her. She experienced the beauty of nature, where there was no judgement, just life teaming with energy and opportunity. And bonds of friendship and loyalty with strangers who had to discover ways to live and work together in order to be successful. On her return she started to think about connecting with other people, particularly with young people like herself, some of whom have never had the opportunity to experience anything other than poverty and hardship. She wanted to explore if a connection with nature, could touch them in a similar way that it had with herself. This led to the start of City Girl in Nature, as a way to give back to her community. To share her love and passion for the outdoors, and belief that everybody should have the chance to be healed, to be nourished, and to life with abundance.
Watch the panel recording here:
