When This Tree Blossoms

When This Tree Blossoms 2021.

On a cold and windy day on the 5th April 2021, eight people met together under the tree. The Future Machine appeared for the first time, playing the sounds of the wind. People left messages for the future.

Miss Bird’s class from Mellers Primary School in Nottingham made bird light boxes that were hung from the tree and powered with hand generators to light up the blossoms.

Christ Church Gardens
Ilkeston Rd, Nottingham NG7 3GS.
https://goo.gl/maps/bDpUyph9QKQ

When This Tree Blossoms… began in 2018

 

The first event took place when the artists Frank Abbott and Rachel Jacobs followed the blossoming of the cherry trees in Christ Church Gardens across the road from their studios at Primary. They made a short video message inviting people online to watch the blossom and join them when it was agreed the trees had blossomed. By pointing a webcam on the trees they enabled a debate online as people from around the world speculated on the time of blossoming.

 

Those local people who heard about it finally met together on Sunday 22nd April under the trees, when they were in full blossom, to talk about the future.

Under the Blossoming Tree from Roger Suckling on Vimeo.

 When This Tree Blossomed (2019)

We met under the trees on Friday 5th April, 2019 at 7pm and talked about the future of the project and the gardens, marked the date, ate blossom cake and samosas. As the sun went down Frank took a photo and made a film.

The extraordinarily warm winter led to the blossom emerging far earlier, before they had even set up a process of observation. And the horrific circumstances of the terror incident in Christchurch, New Zealand, where Facebook was used to livestream the killing online, soured any thought of an innocent use of remote cameras in public space, particularly called Christ Church.

A few visits to the garden were recorded in Frank Abbott’s garden diaries.

 

 

 

When This Tree Blossomed (2020)

We had been preparing to meet in the gardens with the Future Machine – when the the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown started. As we waited for the trees to blossoms, Frank Abbott created a series of video diaries, documented online here: http://christchurchgardens.whenthefuturecomes.net

These video diaries also provide documentation of Nottingham going into lockdown, as well as the two major storms that hit England in Spring 2020. A ‘building a future machine’ workshop with Mellers Primary School also took place just before the lockdown in preparation for staff and students to join us under the trees. Other local residents, artists and audiences connected to Primary engaged with watching the trees coming into blossom by sending photos of the gardens once lockdown was in place and sharing photos of blossoms they could see from whereever they were in lockdown.

We were unable to meet when the trees fully blossomed in the week of the 27th April because of the lockdown.

cherry tree in blossom 2020 taken by Anna and Robin during lockdown
The cherry tree in blossom in Christ Church Gardens in 2020 taken by Anna and Robin during lockdown

When These Leaves Fall (Autumn) 2020

Since we were unable to meet in the Spring, due to Covid-19 and the first lockdown we explored ways we can continue our work in Christ Church Gardens. Frank now does a daily run through the garden, continuing to film the gardens, the cherry tree and this pandemic year.

In November 2020 we made a remote video in Christ Church Gardens, as the leaves fall from the cherry tree as artist Caroline Locke planted a new cherry tree to replace the tree that fell during the extreme weather in March, she rang her Tree Charter bell to celebrate Tree Charter Day, to begin a conversation about tree planting and public spaces. Frank Abbott ran past on his daily run, as the bell was rung, and made a live call to artist Rachel Jacobs, locked down in London with the Future Machine.

Frank left a message for the Future on the Future Machine, live from Christ Church Garden via the remote video link.

https://player.vimeo.com/video/501861662
 

What is this ritual or special occasion about?
‘When this tree blossoms…’ involves watching the cherry trees blossom in Christ Church Gardens, sent out on social media and locally through posters and postcards, to invite people to the gardens as a regular annual event. This involves thinking about series of strategies which relate us to the specificities of the space and the community that we are part of which surrounds it, to develop a series of rituals or moments which enable a process of thinking about the future. Narratives will be pursued which aim towards the bringing together of people in terms which avoid the conventions of inner city urban space – issues of access, surveillance, care and control. Rather, we aim to create an emerging curiosity driven approach to this little parcel of land within the city.

Please join the conversation about when the tree is in full blossom and when the time is right to meet by leaving a reply in the comment box below..

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7 thoughts on “When This Tree Blossoms”

  1. It looks like the blossom has started! Today Frank is doing his first video. It looks like this year is going to be fast, no beast from the east this time! It has been quite mild and another warm spell is expected. This time last year there wasn’t a flower in sight.

  2. It’s been so rapid. My cherry tree in my garden developed and then lost its blossom in the space of about a week, most disappointing as I would have liked to enjoy it longer.

  3. We are now meeting on Friday 5th April under the cherry trees in Christ Church Gardens at 7pm to talk about the future of the project and celebrate the trees blossoming. There will be tea and coffee but bring warm clothes as the temperatures are expected to drop later this week!

  4. We have started videoing the blossom trees this year (2020) in February as some of the earlier blossoms are already out and the buds are readying themselves on the trees. I’m hoping for a cold spell and snow in the next few weeks to slow them down otherwise I think they will be ready for the beginning of March – a full month before last year and nearly 2 months before the blossoms in 2018…. but lets see what the trees want to do!

  5. We are getting ready for the blossoms in Christ Church Gardens this year – in 2021. It does feel like the future has come when I re-read the past blossoms! The tree has gone into full blossom on the 22nd April, 5th April and last year, in the end the full blossom was recorded as the 27th April, way after lockdown started, even though it was such a lovely warm Spring – we are trying to work out when it will be this year. I’m thinking after Easter, about the 16th… but it has been a cold winter and Spring so far, so maybe it is more likely to be late!

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