New Forest Artist In Residence programme seeks submissions for next creative stage

New Forest Artist In Residence programme seeks submissions for next creative stage

Artists are invited to submit expressions of interest for the next New Forest National Park Artist in Residence Programme. The internationally recognised project from arts and education charity SPUD and the New Forest National Park Authority started in 2022, and has so far welcomed seven different artists to month-long residencies at SpudWorks in Sway, in the heart of the New Forest.

The residencies explore the way we think about the New Forest landscape, how different people interact with it, and the challenges it faces both present and future. Artists of any discipline and from any location can apply for the residency. The brief is purposefully open to encourage artists to connect with local and national audiences with site-specific work and a final gallery show six months on from the initial stay.

Generously funded by Arts Council England, the programme seeks to develop creative partnerships between the arts and the people who work, live, and visit the New Forest.  Together SPUD and the New Forest National Park Authority work closely on several projects in which the arts are integral to our understanding of landscape, people, and nature. 

Multi-disciplinary artists Em Burrows and Jeremy Segal who were selected as Artists in Residence last year, return to SpudWorks in May with their exhibition and sound installation ‘New Forest Collage Radio’ – an interactive community-based sound collage. New Forest Collage Radio is an amalgamation of New Forest sounds that explore the concept of community radio within the New Forest landscape, posing questions around connection, representation, culture and grass roots creativity. The installation will take the form of a spatial radio station within the gallery that visitors can explore using handheld radios. Burrows and Segal will also collate four programmes to broadcast on The Tower Radio throughout the month.

Whilst their exhibition is running, Copenhagen-based artist Isabella Martin will be starting her residency and researching ‘New Forest Time’. Isabella’s practices encompass ideas of time and space combined with scientific knowledge on environment and biology. She intends to map local rhythms and cycles of the Forest in collaboration with local communities, starting with the question ‘What time is it in the Forest?’.

She said: ‘The science of circadian rhythms reveals how our bodies keep time in rhythm with our environment. This inspires an interest in the specific rhythms of our environment, and how we can connect biological and ecological temporalities. How can we entangle our rhythms with those of the Forest? And what can we learn from Forest time?’

New Forest National Park Authority Board Member and artist Caroline Rackham said: ‘The New Forest is often described as ‘old but forever new’ and this quality makes it an interesting place to explore the theme of time. I look forward to seeing how Isabella will interpret the different timescales in the Forest with ancient roots but continual change. It’s a fascinating theme’.

Artists can apply for the next New Forest National Park Artist In Residence here. Applications close on 2 May 2025.

‘New Forest Collage Radio’ is on from 1 – 31 May 2025 at SpudWorks, Station Road, Sway, Hampshire SO41 6BA.