Happy Winter Solstice!

We are observing the longest night of the year by revisiting a collection of music, stories, and poetry contributed some of our storytellers. On this long night, we are holding space for the darkness, the waiting, and the possibilities that can only emerge from the dark.

With gratitude for the co-creators of Solstice Stories:

Story sharing by: Youssef Ismael, Alrie Middlebrook, and Vicente Moreno

Music performed by: Michelé Crowder, Viveka Hall-Holt, Tess McCarty, Zoë García, and Grace Alexander.

Poetry by: Robert Hasselblad and Will Rand

Katherine Boland is an artist and advocate for the climate. Based on the southeast coast of Australia, Katherine experienced the terrifying impacts of the bush fires that gripped global headlines in 2019. As a multi-disciplinary artist, Katherine creates evocative work that holds space for the coexistence of beauty and devastation. Her work focuses on shining light on climate change and the ecological crisis we are facing globally.

This episode also features a few excerpts of “Burning” by Grace Brigham. Grace composed “Burning” to reflect on the perilousness of the fires in the Amazon rainforest and Australia between 2019 and 2020. This piece was never premiered due to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The EarthStory Podcast returns for a third season beginning with the artistry of Théodora Jonsson. As an artist and archeologist, she explores the geology of the Pacific Northwest listening to the poetry of the land. She creates art and sound in response to her deep listening. Her creativity is a duet, of sorts, with the world around her.

Théo collects tree saps and resins from around the world. She reduces them into paint resins to use for painting and printmaking. It is like she is painting with the tree and the tree is painting with her. It is a true collaboration.

As a multi-modal artist, she practices printmaking and glass blowing from sound vibrations. She observes how shapes transform when they move through water, rock, and ice. She also explores natural transformation from heating, cooling, and tension, learning from eons of evolution as well as how climate change affects us today.

In our conversation, Théo shared stories from her childhood exploring the Pacific Northwest with her family on foot and in the water. In the video below, Théo shares her work and artistic process from inside her studio above a resplendent meadow overlooking the Skagit Valley.