DIRECTOR’S NOTE

I’m often asked “what kind of films do you make?” and find it tricky to come up with a neat response. Probably, “a movement or an individual that captures and inspires my curiosity”. I’ve made films on Biodiversity, Regenerative farming, the British aristocracy and Colonialism, Sydney’s underworld and Lesbian and Gay Mardi Gras, Wine-making in France, and many more. A documentary is a journey into the unknown: the story you first conceive of is often not the one that emerges after years of filming and daunting challenges. Yet we film-makers relish the sharing of stories, to bear witness and to show the world in an alternate light.

Inspired by the euphoria around Greta Thunberg’s Schools Strike for Climate, and Extinction Rebellion’s International uprising in 2019, I joined this extraordinary groundswell of defiance. I wanted to add my voice. It soon became clear that participating in protests with a like-minded community of all ages wasn’t enough: I needed a prism through which to tell this story. When I met Heather Ackroyd and Dan Harvey, who co-founded Culture Declares Emergency in 2019, I saw at first hand the vital role art can play in raising awareness and shifting perspectives. I had my prism.

Dan Harvey, Love Ssega, Heather Ackroyd, Fiona Cunningham-Reid

Culture Declares persuaded cultural institutions and artists up and down the country to declare climate emergencies and to examine working practices, cut emissions, reduce waste, investigate supply lines and seek justice,working towards regenerative change. Even the UK Parliament caved in and became the world’s first to declare a climate emergency.

These heady victories were not to last. The government did not legislate a single law to mitigate the climate crisis. The UK fragmented into Brexit arguments. Covid followed. It was as if a giant balloon had lost its air. The world almost came to a halt and the government seized the opportunity to introduce and impose the most draconian anti-protest laws in British history. Our little film-making group, as if mirroring the world’s gloom, went through overwhelming health and personal issues. The artists 30 year relationship broke-down, I and my partner went through cancer scares, my editor’s husband died. I put down my camera.

The natural world, however, enjoyed the respite offered by the pandemic over two stilled years. It was that glimmer of hope that saw us emerge from our respective cocoons. Ackroyd & Harvey had new commissions and despite marital tensions continued to work together. We decided to start filming again. My wonderful editor, Catherine Arend, wanting distraction from mourning her husband was keen to engage with the film. Her intelligence and clarity saw the potential of the many, many hours of accumulated material and moulded it into what I think is an inspirational and intimate film about art, climate and hope in our very uncertain world.