Introducing the CLF blog...

This blog is for news, information and chat about the AHRC research network 'Creative landscape futures: making decisions with the arts and humanties'.

Principal Investigator: Jo Vergunst, University of Aberdeen
Co-Investigator: Anne Bevan, Orkney College, University of the Highlands and Islands

The network runs from February 2020 to February 2022.

From our original proposal, here's the summary of what the network will do.

This research network will bring together academics and a range of stakeholders to explore the ways that arts and humanities research can contribute to decision-making about landscapes. Our focus is Scotland, which has its own legal setting and distinctive forms of land ownership - and distinctive landscapes - and we will also make connections with the rest of the UK and beyond. We will hold a series of seminars to share insights, with some hosted by our non-academic stakeholder participants, and carry out further field visits to meet with stakeholders.

Our objectives are as follows.

- First, we will explore the emergence of cultural values in relations with landscape through the various disciplinary perspectives in our network, and directly through field visits and stakeholder engagement. Notions of cultural value that are useful for landscape decisionmaking, and go beyond economic and environmental rationales (although without denying their significance), will be a key theme for impact.

- Second, we will promote models for wider participation and find ways to involve stakeholders, communities and the public in landscape decision-making, drawn from socially-engaged art and community heritage amongst others.

- Third, we will develop a broad notion of temporality - by which we mean an understanding of the qualities of time – to connect between past, present and future in landscape decision-making. Our archaeology and heritage participants will show the importance of smaller scale stories of places, as well as the 'grand narratives' of the Scottish landscape.

- Fourth, we will investigate case studies in Scotland and comparisons to the UK and beyond. We will draw on our network participants' research, but also interrogate and challenge each other to consider the significance of our work specifically for decision-making. To do this we will conduct field visits to meet stakeholders in a range of landscape settings.

Fifth, we will work together to synthesise the findings of the network for audiences including landowners and managers, policy-makers, communities and the wider public. As well as written outputs for academic and stakeholder audiences, we will host an exhibition with arts-led and other contributions from our network. A website will also document and archive our work.