Tree Tales: Art in the Branches

Friday 27 March / 6–8pm / Open Eye Gallery / RSVP

Join The Tree Council at Open Eye Gallery for an evening exploring the creative connection between people, trees and the natural world. Young artists Sonia Poppi and Cara Ng, whose work has previously been exhibited as part of the gallery’s LOOK Climate Lab programme, will lead ‘Bookmark Your Tree’, a hands-on creative workshop inviting participants to reflect on their relationship with trees and place. Using watercolour and natural forms inspired by leaves and flowers, the session encourages participants to create small artworks while exploring how creativity can help us notice and care for the landscapes around us.

The evening will also feature an interactive exploration of PlantWave, a device that translates the electrical signals of plants into music, allowing participants to create sound by touching different parts of a plant or tree. Hosted by Benjamin Haycock, an international award-winning singer-songwriter and environmental advocate, and Richard Pollard, Head of the National Schools Programme at The Tree Council, the event will conclude with a live acoustic performance from Benjamin Haycock. His work brings together music, storytelling and environmental engagement through projects presented across the UK at venues including 10 Downing Street, the National Exhibition Centre and Kew Gardens.

Artist bios:

Sonia Popi

Hello, I’m Sonia Popi

I’m a college student who wanted to combine my two greatest passions, textile work and nature. In collaboration with the Open Eye Gallery, to create a long pattern of mold and photograph its detail. My insertion for the replaced mold pattern was from a rotten apple I found in the college’s garden. For this project, I wanted to focus on the end of life of nature and reflect on the cycle of life and its connection to nature.

Cara Ng

One of my biggest hobbies in life is drawing. It is one of the earliest hobbies I have ever come across and I still consider it to take up a large part of my life until now. I have been inspired by the Japanese anime-styled illustrations and my work has been heavily circulated around the style ever since. It always interests me in the varied ways where I can perceive an image in styles that I have never been taught in school before, and I have been captivated by it ever since. One of my biggest inspirations is the artist Little Thunder, an artist from Hong Kong, where I came from and I have always been inspired by the way she uses her colours and her stunning compositions, and how she always draws images that are very reminiscent of my memories of growing up in Hong Kong. 

Even if I have been trying to learn illustration through imitating the styles of other artists, I have been recently trying to perceive the images I want to create in my own way, with my own thoughts and feelings.

One of my biggest inspirations are my own emotions. When I am unsure of a subject to draw off, I tend to lean towards trying to capture an image based on what I am feeling as I have always thought that my emotions are the rawest ways in which I think are accurate enough in how I can express myself. 

Even if I can be unsure of my own style and my skills from time to time, my passion for illustration always takes me back to my motivation to create more works until I can finally find where my talent takes me.