Ep.11 – The fabric of Bowland with Kate O’Farrell

Ep.11 – The fabric of Bowland with Kate O’Farrell

Rob chats to creative partner Kate O’Farrell about the creation of the textile pieces in Are You Lost? Her work draws from the cotton mill weaving practices of East Lancashire, the textile traditions of Gujarat, where a significant diaspora in Nelson is from, and natural materials and processes derived from the Bowland landscape. Fabrication techniques include spinning, embroidery, wet and dry felting, botanical contact printing, rust printing and natural dyeing using gorse, bracken, rowan, birch, oak and peat. One piece has been created from felted wool gathered from Bowland farms, whilst the others are based on hand-woven cotton khadi made by artisan weavers in Gujurat. Greystones Textiles: https://www.greystonestextiles.co.uk/  Resources: Gandhi in Bowland: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lancashire-15020097 Bowland’s Felt Hats and the Slave Trade: https://lahs.archaeologyuk.org/Contrebis/Workman%20Lancaster%20hats%20.pdf Facing the Past in Lancaster: https://www.facingthepast.org/ Documenting the exploitation of enslaved people by Lancashire traders: https://blackhistory.shareyourstories.live/history/every-lancashire-slave-owner-and-how-much-compensation-they-received-from-the-abolition/

Ep.10 – Art, Nature and Community in the Forest of Bowland

In this episode we tune in to a conversation on art, nature and community held as part of the final Bowland installation of Are You Lost? in Gisburn Forest in August 2025. The discussion is led by Jocelyn Cunningham, director of Lancaster Arts, and features Jenny Rutter, Chief Executive of the British Textile Biennial, Associate Director of Super Slow Way, and Chair of Creative Lancashire, and Anna Taylor, Head of Critical Engagement at In Situ, an arts and community organisation based in East Lancashire. The trio discuss their work, and wider issues around socially-engaged environmental art, with Rob and a group of people, both from Bowland and its fringes.

Ep.9 – Singing Bowland with Jules Evans

In this episode, Rob speaks to choir leader and composer Jules Evans at the second installation of Are You Lost? in Dunsop Bridge in August 2025. We hear about Jules' approach to socially-engaged art, and his collaborations with Rob working taking young people out into Bowland to sing together. Jules tells us about his work with a new choir, The Stonechats, who will present new work based on the memories and places mapped across Bowland by hundreds of people at Gisburn Forest on 31st August.

Ep.8 – Openness, Imagination, Transparency

In this episode, artist Rob St John introduces the year-long community work in and around Bowland which has shaped the Are You Lost? project. He describes how the film, sound and textile installation pieces have been created with local people, alongside artists Kate O'Farrell and Jules Evans. We then hear the sound work itself, featuring the voices of three local people who attended workshops – Nita Burrows, William Michael Neary and Zainab Maria – narrating texts about the multiple meanings of access in Bowland, assembled from words written in public workshops, field trips, scientific research and historical archives. The narrators reflect on how access to Bowland’s landscapes orbits around openness, imagination and transparency.

Ep.7 – Storying Bowland

In this episode we meet Jane Routh, a poet and woodland restorationist on the Tatham Fells in Bowland. We talk about native woodland restoration on her land, the histories of enclosure and drove roads in the area, and how living and working in this corner of Bowland has inspired her award-winning poetry. Jane reads her poem ‘One Place’ from her kitchen table looking out over the fells. We finish by hearing an excerpt from the soundscape in the new Women in Farming exhibition held at Clitheroe Castle this summer. Created in collaboration with Tarja Wilson from the Forest of Bowland National Landscape, the soundscape features stories from six female farmers across Bowland. Their voices are woven with the sounds of the fells, recorded at dawn by Rob, and the farmyard, recorded by young people from Yes Hub in Nelson on farm visits. Episode image by Tarja Wilson.