Leach Pottery and the Sensory Trust present:

The Walking Impressions Exhibition

A display of work from their collaborative arts and wellbeing project

for people living with dementia in the St Ives area

Wednesday 9th to Sunday 20th November

From 9th to 20th November, The Leach Pottery and Sensory Trust present an exhibition of work from their collaborative ‘Walking Impressions’ arts and wellbeing project for people living with dementia in the St Ives area. Walking Impressions is part of the Sensory Trust’s ‘Creative Spaces in the Community’ project which invites dementia sufferers and their carers to get outdoors and engage with nature, enhancing their physical and mental wellbeing and reducing isolation and loneliness.

Over a six-week period from August to October, 18 local participants and their carers took part in two studio sessions and four walks around St Uny Church in Lelant, the King George Memorial Walk in Hayle, the village of St Erth and Marazion Marshes, collecting items such as leaves, shells, ferns and flowers, making clay impressions of stone carvings and ironwork, gathering marsh reeds for use as mark making tools, and collecting clay from the banks of the River Hayle.

In the studio, lead project artist Jackie Clark worked with the group to explore connections between landscape, nature and memory, using collected materials to incise, impress and decorate a series of ceramic tiles which form the exhibition’s final artwork – a collaborative mural that traces the group’s shared sensory and geographical journey.

Also on show is a collection of 313 handmade ceramic pebbles created by the group, which represents the number of people living with dementia in the vicinity of the walks, along with a specially commissioned documentary film of the Walking Impressions project by Richard Liddicott.

If you are living with dementia or care for a person who is, and are interested in taking part in future projects please contact Andrea Ellis, Project Officer at Sensory Trust, creativespaces@sensorytrust.org.uk, 07534 992588, www.sensorytrust.org.uk or Jackie Clark, Learning and Participation Officer at the Leach Pottery, 01736 799703, The Leach Pottery, Higher Stennack, St Ives, Cornwall, TR26 2HE, www.leachpottery.com.

This project has been made possible by Feast, Arts Council England and Cornwall Council. The programme is managed by Creative Kernow.