Winter Gathering 2025

Join us at our Winter Gathering for the opening of an exhibition of action and learning undertaken in 2025 by local people in the woodlands, waterways, neighbourhoods and towns of Dudley borough.

Active Hope: community-led responses to the mess we’re in honours and calls into relationship the writing and practical work of Joanna Macy with the creativity, care, capabilities and action of our local communities.

Quiet Time Early Opening of exhibitions 5pm-6pm (main gathering opens at 6pm)

Pockets of Hope ~ an exhibition of 145 pockets created by 114 local people of all ages, symbolising and/or containing their hopes for a sustainable world and flourishing futures. You can add a pocket and hope for the future to the exhibition on the night.

Restorying our Relationships with Land ~ poetry readings from members of Dudley’s newly forming Bioregional Learning Network

The Council of All Beings ~ an installation of biodegradable masks and audio recordings from a gathering held in Hawbush co-created by 12 local people giving voice to the plights and gifts of Fox, Owl, Ocean, Moth, Nettle, Ash, Sparrow, Hedgerow, Beetle, Tree, River and Limpet. The Council of All Beings is a practice created by Joanna Macy.

Seeing with New/Ancient Eyes ~ a large scale, evolving, multi-layered installation sharing many kinds of unusual data collected through Dudley People’s School for Climate Justice work in 2025 inviting us to “sense how intimately and completely we are related to all that is” - as Joanna Macy’s Spiral journey in The Work That Reconnects invites.

Tea Tasting ~ with Reclaim our Roots, a hands-on community herbalism group who meet in Hawbush Community Gardens, Brierley Hill and explore wild edges all around Dudley borough.

Village Dreams ~ conversations and installations exploring the hopes of local people of all generations, including those who have been taking part in an outdoor Village Kitchen Experiment with Ekho Collective CIC and Black Country Foodbank, transforming food bank staples by foraging, growing food and forming friendships.

Water themed conversations at the Revolution Booth ~ revolutionary talk about the importance of water in our local ecosystem, from ponds to our local canals and the River Stour, from Workshop 24’s Getting Into Hot Water inquiry.

A garden which helps create new gardens ~ conversations about plans to establish the Black Country’s first Mother Garden in Brierley Hill, led by local people who have been learning together through Tending People, Place and Planet.

Good to know
🎟️ Free admission

☕️ Warming winter drinks and light nibbles (free)

🧑‍🧒‍🧒 All welcome, children must bring a grown up 😊

👩🏽‍🦽‍➡️Step-free access is available to the full exhibition. We’re sorry that due to the constraints of the building we rent, the toilets are sited upstairs so we there are no toilet facilities at street level.

💬 Access resources include large print guides (please request in advance) and in-person guides offering audio descriptions and conversation. We will do our best to offer British Sign Language translation / translation to languages other than English if requested up to 14 days in advance of your planned visit.

🗓️ Other times you can visit the exhibitions and installations, in 2026:

• Wed 14 Jan, 10am-2pm
• Sat 17 Jan, 10am-2pm
• Wed 21 Jan, 10am-2pm
• Wed 4 Feb, 10am-2pm

Joanna Macy and The Work That Reconnects

Joanna Macy, PhD, was a scholar of Buddhism, General Systems Theory, and Deep Ecology. She is the root teacher of the Work That Reconnects. Joanna passed away on 19 July 2025 at the age of 96.

is meant for anyone who longs to serve the healing of our world in a more powerful and effective way. It was developed over several decades by Joanna Macy in cooperation with many colleagues. Active Hope: How to Face the Mess We’re in without Going Crazy is a book written by Joanna Macy and Chris Johnstome. “Active Hope is about finding, and offering, our best response when facing concerns about our world situation.” See more at http://www.activehope.info/

Our aspiration is to introduce and honour Joanna Macy’s work and life by sharing and celebrating practices, action and learning rooted in our local communities, and illuminating common themes and threads of connection between them. We’ve drawn on wording used by Joanna Macy, and one of our installations celebrates a practice created by Joanna Macy which we introduced to people in Dudley this year (The Council of All Beings).

Exhibition curation

Our exhibition curator is Deb McDonald ~ a local creative, member of the CoLab Dudley team and partner in Dudley People’s School for Climate Justice with Ekho Collective CIC.

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