Alastair McIntosh, environmental campaigner and acclaimed author will speak in Bristol as a guest of The Bristol Ecoshows on Monday February 15th 7.30pm on the 3rd Floor, Bush House (above the Arnolfini) 72 Prince Street BS1 4QD £3 entry. The venue has disability access.

Acclaim for McIntosh’s book on Climate Change ‘Hell And High Water’: “inspirational” Archbishop of Canterbury, “truly mental” Thom Yorke of Radiohead

There’ll be a brief introduction to The Bristol Ecoshows, a new grass roots initiative connected to Transition Bristol. The coordinator David Mowat says: “It’s about using community-based arts practitioners of all kinds to mobilize Bristol as a city to dramatically reduce its environmental impact, celebrating the results in ‘ecoshows’. At the same time the arts practitioners working with neighbourhood clusters of businesses and community groups aim to increase a sense of community across the city and positive connections with nature. That’s a tall order, and along the way they’ll have to engage with powerful vested interests. Especially in the wake of the collapse of multilateral deals at Copenhagen, making grassroots movements work in cities everywhere is vital now”.

What can we learn about bringing systemic (as opposed to individual lifestyle) change to where we are, in Bristol? This is the question we’ll grapple with through hearing McIntosh, a ‘human ecologist’ who’s long pondered the relationships between the natural environment and the social environment. As an activist he has successfully helped lead community campaigns to limit the damaging power of the rich and powerful in The Hebrides. His practical dealings with city authorities have come through community development with the GalGael Trust in Glasgow. He’s been deeply involved, through the land reform movement in Scotland, with how people can powerfully engage with environmental issues when they feel ownership of the land they live on. He’ll use the island of Eigg as a case study in how town can connect with country before his audience explores the implications this has for Bristol.

Fundamentally, artists try and connect with their inner creativity to express to the rest of us the truth of life in out of the ordinary ways, which ties in with McIntosh’s own description of his varied work “What joins it all up is a fundamental passion for that which gives life – with community that is social, ecological and even spiritual”

For more details ring 0780 436 3170
About Alastair McIntosh www.alastairmcintosh.com
About The Bristol Ecoshows www.ecoshow.org.uk

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.