The Desire Lines film launches at Keswick Museum this week, alongside an exhibition of costumes and props from the project - the culmination of a yearlong programme of activity in partnership with National Trust at Crow Park.

The Desire Lines project has explored the connections humans have with the natural world, and how a relationship with a local green space can open up wider questions - including conservation, climate change, ecology and access. We’ve worked with over 100 people in Keswick since January 2020 (and throughout the Covid lockdowns) ranging from pupils at St Herbert’s Primary School, to members of Sustainable Keswick, producing a rage of workshops, writing, podcasts, design and poetry and now culminating in a film which premiered at the Alhambra cinema in Keswick to a screening of participants in October.

The film features seven characters – played by community performers - who roam Crow Park, revealing aspects of the landscape from different perspectives. Garbed in unusual costumes that reference different entities - including weather, bird, and rock - the characters move through time and space, feeling out their relationship with each other and the land. From tensions between characters, to interdependence; ancient fish to mineral extraction; the rise and fall of the lake to transformed landscapes; the film explores many-layered histories and imagined futures of Crow Park.

More information and credits here.

Photo: Lexie Ward