a note on Water
Holding relationship
At the opening of Hidden Paths at ONCA we made water ceremony on Brighton beach for the healthy outcomes of the Hive and that it may spread informed awareness of Systems Change.
Water ceremony is made with respect and celebration for the vital and sacred nature of water as the source of life and in peaceful resistance to a culture that is out of balance.
The Brighton Water ceremony was one continuing stream of the Fellowship of the Spring’s Water Pilgrimage. During Easter 2019, hundreds of water activists came together in support of growing awareness and action for the environmental situation. Waters from all over the planet were blended together on the banks of the Thames. The pilgrimage was dedicated to the deeply loved lawyer and activist Polly Higgins and Mission LifeForce: Stop Ecocide.
The journey of water
During the ONCA exhibition a small amount of water was on display. This water was collected at Te Awa Tupua - the Whanganui river - in Aotearoa New Zealand and displayed through the exhibition as legally self-sovereign water.
A bottle of water collected during the Environmental Protests in London in Easter 2019 was offered in Aotearoa New Zealand in the gardens at Parihaka, a community known for embodying strong peaceful resistance in the face of the invasion of English forces in 1881. This water offering was made in respect to the reparations for crimes against indigenous communities and in the hope that the UK and other Industrialised countries can understand and work to make ammends for the injustices of the past and the exploitation of native land and healthy ecosystems. Then a small amount of water was gathered at Whanganui and brought back to Brighton.
It was vital for us to respect the life of this water and instead of packing this water in the exhibition’s touring materials, which ran the risk that the bottle got lost or smashed, we offered the water back to the earth at a Spring in St Helen’s Woods in Hastings after the ONCA showing. This final water ceremony was led by Charlotte Pulver on the 12th December 2019 and completed the Hidden Paths water journey.
Water Ceremonies will continue in 2020 throughout the UK. For info visit the British Pilgrimage Trust and the Fellowship of the Spring.
︎Creative Commons 2019