Mindful Artful Perambulation – Watchtree Nature Reserve

Working with walking as art and mindfulness

Mindful, Artful, Perambulations is series of short outdoor experiences designed to help people use walking and art making as a form of mindfulness to promote mental health.

Walks will be undertaken around Carlisle using ideas from the arts therapies to help people connect with themselves and nature and the more than human world. This is seen as complementary to more traditional hiking and rambling. People will be invited to slow down and use walking as a way to attend to their own experience through a variety of simple art based activities using walking, words and pictures. Art skills are not necessary to take part in these walks but are helpful and will be developed over time. All materials are provided, but are simple enough to be carried in a backpack.

These walks are developed as 'perambulations', acts of wandering, wondering and encountering the world in an artful curious way. Much of this process and content is informed by a long history of walking as art starting in 20th century. There are currently thousands of walking art practitioners around the world and their work may be usexd as source material to help participants develop their own perambulation practice. You will be invited and guided to develop walking as a creative act. This is where the health benefits emerge.

We will walk in the normal way to get to spots in sites, where you may take part in short periods of creative activity to stimulate your imagination, make simple art, and encounter the outdoor world through mindful practice. You will be guided to attend to nature and the more than human world in a creative artful way. Not everyone can be artist, but anyone can make art. With guidance, through your perambulations, you will all make art, on your own or collectively. Through this you will also learn the core themes of mindfulness; intention, attention and open attitude. Through this you may connect more deeply with the more than human world.

There will be three mindful artful perambulations, one a month in September, October, November 2025. These will be around Carlisle, in Kingmoor Nature Reserve, Watchtree Nature Reserve and Bitts Park. These are chosen for their ease of accessibility and as an intersection between the natural and the human world. Each can be encountered as an  independent themed standalone, but they will work well as a series. In attending these three as a series we may have an opportunity to develop community and support for ramblers seeking to develop this as part of their personal mental heath regime and as part of their personal arts practice.

Walks will comprise short hikes punctuated by wandering perambulations at specific, chosen sites, for slower artful, mindful activity. All hikes and perambulations will be safely guided and meaningful. Actual content will emerge out of the place and the people on the day as an adventure of imagination.

The walks will be facilitated by Chris Reed a retired man living in Brampton. Chris has had 40 years professional practice in experiential outdoor learning and care in the UK, EU and USA and is an HCPC Registered Drama and Movement Therapist. Chris has also been engaged in personal arts practice, including walking, art making and performance for over ten years. This emerged out of a need to manage his own mental health. This informs and guides the work.

Support material is available at movingspaceart.uk and content is posted and developed on an ongoing basis. Viewing this is recommended.