Croome’s creative programme is committed to socially engaged practice. We work with artists and communities to bring to life the stories of our past for audiences of today and the future. It was important that the artist commissioned to lead Four Seasons work collaboratively with local community partners to explore the history of the Four Seasons statues and Croome landscape, alongside contemporary concerns including nature connection, seasonality and climate change.
Participants from four diverse groups developed ideas for the new sculptures through creative activities that explored individual and shared experiences of the seasons, with natural tie dye, poetry, cyanotypes, clay, hapa-zome, junk modelling, miniature garden-making, scent, splatter painting, origami, scratch art and more.
Elements from the activities were chosen by participants to co-design the final sculptures. They chose spheres to echo the rolling shapes and protective ‘bubble' atmosphere of Croome’s landscape. Timber from a storm damaged ‘Capability’ Brown cedar reflects the site’s history and challenges presented by climate change. Each group added strong individual details, such as, women past and present represented in the landscape, and hibernation before new beginnings a central metaphor for winter.
“Four Seasons project is incredibly special because it’s being co-created with some vulnerable communities that face the greatest barriers to the benefits of heritage and culture. It feels like we’re enacting the Trust’s pledge ‘forever, for everyone’ and hopefully inspiring many others, for years to come, to see their place in this special landscape.” – Faye Claridge.