About the event

Join the Saving Devon's Treescapes project and Spork! to get involved in this unique opportunity to hone your writing skills, connect to nature and create poems which commemorate, celebrate and encapsulate the Ash tree. Your pieces will contribute to our beautiful Ash Archive; an artistic and emotional response to Ash Dieback disease.

About Ash Dieback

There are around 1.9 million mature ash trees outside of woodlands in Devon with up to 90% of them due to be affected by Ash Dieback. Ash Dieback is a fungal disease which originated in Asia and was first recognised in the UK in 2012. Sadly our native ash trees have no natural defence against it.

About the workshops

This is a 2 part workshop, dates and times:

Thursday 16th May & Thursday 30th May - 5.15 - 6.45 PM. Please ensure you book onto both sessions.

Across 2 sessions at Exeter Library poets Chris White and Ceri Baker will lead you to craft your own individual responses to our local Ash, with a series of poetry exercises, sharing and feedback. We’ll be joined by arboriculturalist Pete Baker, who has vast experience of dealing with the daily fallout of Ash Dieback, and we will discuss how to best access and connect with your local trees. These workshops will help to introduce you to the Ash tree, and to see it in a new way, as well as exploring our interconnected relationship to nature, and new approaches to poetry writing.

These workshops will be engaging, accessible and informative - even if you don’t have any particular experience or knowledge of ash trees or ash dieback, you’ll have a crash course in everything you need to know, from how to identify an Ash, to learning about the conservation measures being taken.

Ceri Baker is the current “Bard of Exeter;” a multiple slam-winning poet, performer and facilitator who has run sessions as diverse as poetry workshops in prison, to poetry and yoga with children. She is currently creating a new commissioned piece for the Saving Devon's Treescapes project on Ash Trees.

Chris White is a poet, performer and the founder of Spork! Poetry. The first Riddler in Residence at Exeter Cathedral, Chris has facilitated sessions in schools and community centres, as well as bringing his silly and subversive work to festivals and nights across the UK, from Tongue Fu to Shambala.

Saving Devon's Treescapes is led by Devon Wildlife Trust on behalf of the Devon Ash Dieback Resilience Forum. It's a partnership project supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund as well as other funders. Read more about the project and find other ways to get involved here.