Soil Conscious

Soil Conscious is our on-going 20 year engagement with the living matter of soil. In collaboration with Miche’s ritual art and Flora’s geographical practices, Daphne Lambert of Greencuisine Trust brings her nutritional wisdoms and experience to Soil Conscious. Our collaborative explorations of the vibrant interdependence between the well-being of the human body and the body of the Earth are embedded in ecological nutrition, ritual practices and encounters with the land.

Co-creating vibrant stories to live by - stories of integration within the shared ecological interdependence of the living Earth.

the future is in our hands - the future is in the soil -

the future is in our hands - the future is in the soil -

We are honoured to be collaborating with Richard Scott (National Wildflower Centre at the Eden Project) and Polly Moseley (Scouse Flowerhouse) to launch the Cultural Charter for Soil and Substrates at the 22nd World Congress of Soil Science in Glasgow, UK. The Cultural Charter has emerged through collaboration with a growing circle of organisations all dedicated to soil as the source of life. The large-scale banner displayed at the Congress includes artworks by Jamie Reid, writings by Gerry Potter, as well as the soil mantra we created for 2015 UN International Year of Soils ‘The future is in our hands, the future is in the soils’. For further inspirations, thoughts, ideas, images and words please email Richard Scott.

As part of our collaboration with Richard Scott and Polly Moseley, we are co-evolving a contribution to the Charter which honours and promotes the profound inter-relationship between healthy soils, whole nutrition and human gut health.

Cultural Charter for the World Congress of Soil Science 2022

Revive

In 2022, Miche, Daphne and Flora launch Revive as a series of happening that share experiences of life-sustaining food within convivial thanks-giving rituals that honour regenerative forms of soil care. The initiative brings farmers, growers, researchers, educators and producers together to inter-weave new and traditional stories to live by. Revive takes its inspiration from the Mookaite crystal stone, vibrant in mustard, blood red and chalk colouring, and traditionally used for its powers to promote energy and strengthen our immunity.

In July 2022, we hosted our first Revive happening at Timberyard Farm in the East of England. Gratitude to all those who joined us to explore questions and hear each others’ stories of soil, health and community care.

In 2015, Clive Adams, co-founder of the Centre for Contemporary Art and the Natural World and the three-year Soil Culture initiative, invited us to animate two specially-commissioned exhibitions as part of a wider co-curation of a UK contribution to UN International Year of the Soils. Our response, Soil Saturdays emerged through three months of conversations with local organisations and individuals, as well as national groups working to protect soils. Its diverse program spanned eight Saturdays in the Summer of UN International Year of the Soils. The matter of living soil and food was present within the gallery, on the Soil Shrine, as part of activities, and nourishingly and colourfully manifest through freshly prepared food sourced from Bristol and its hinterland and cooked in collaboration with Daphne Lambert of the Greencuisine Trust.

Blue Soil Shrine

“Our collaboration with Miche and Flora has injected refreshment, wise energy, beauty and sensuality into the work. The Alliance has always been about celebrating and cherishing the source of life and finding ways, like soil, to transcend the things that divide us. This Soil Saturdays collaboration brings heart-centred arts into popular and political consciousness and making new ground for policy making.” Maddy Longhurst co-founder of Blue Finger Alliance

“Soil is the source of all life. Soil Saturdays is a timely celebration to remind the world that we are all children of the living soil.” Satish Kumar

With the Blue Finger Alliance we co-evolved Soils of Bristol Soil Saturday with a Walk and Talk for Soil leading to a citizen-led Policy Forum for the crafting of a Bristol City-region Declaration for Soil. This Declaration was embedded within the legacy of Bristol 2015 Green Capital.

British Green MEP Molly Scott Cato invited Touchstones to present our Soil Saturdays film and the Declaration for Soil as an artistic intervention during the Greens/EFA conference ‘Why Soil Matters? A European perspective’ held at the European Parliament in Brussels.

Soil Saturdays initiative went on to receive the AWE-inspiring commendation from the Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management (CIWEM). We were also commissioned to reflect with Clive Adams on the collaborative processes within ‘Curating the Convivial’ published in Geohumanties journal.

Soil Saturdays

Soil Sisters

For over 15 years Soil Sisters Daphne Lambert and Miche Fabre Lewin have been flourishing as Soil Sisters. Their pioneering collaboration cultivates whole health with convivial food encounters which manifest within art galleries, food festivals, environmental gatherings, film screenings and cultural happenings. Soil Sisters’ ecological gastronomy is a feast for belly, mind, soul and soil. Their culinary artistry is a dedicated to whole health on the land, the kitchen and at the table and celebrates artisan traditions of preservation and the honouring of fresh, naturally grown, seasonal produce harvested from small local farms, gardens and foragings.

A selection of projects include: Gastrodome at Hay Festival; Botanical Cocktails the original bespoke artisan cocktails for Abergavenny Food Festival; Intimate Taste of Life at Aldeburgh Food & Drink Festival; Animate Earth rainbow canapés to amplify Stephan Harding’s film; Food of the Land artisan kitchen at Centre for Alternative Technology for Emergence Summit on Art & Sustainability; Daphne’s book Living Food, a feast for Soil and Soul with its contribution by Miche on Revitalising ritual, everyday every mouthful.