John Elkington

A podcast I did with Emma Foster-Geering and Dulma Clark of VIVOBAREFOOT launched today here.

On Thursday, I filmed an interview for the Plantiers World Gathering in Portugal, alongside Paul Hawken. The programme went live today.

I was thinking this morning of all the artists who have influenced by aesthetic sense over the decades – and Giorgos Varlamos came to mind. Born in 1922, he died in 2013. We visited his gallery in Athens during our 1970 Landrover trip to Greece – and bought a print of the image above, Hunters in the Woods. It’s still in the summerhouse.

A highlight of the visit was Giorgos taking us through his photograph albums, almost exclusively black-and-white images. An inspiration for my later albums, largely created in Tessa Fantoni’s albums, bought from her store in Clapham, though my father had kept albums for many decades prior.

I remember talking to Giorgos about how he had developed the image, which was printed from a woodcut, if I remember correctly. He said he had crunched up newspapers as a visual reference during the process, so that the cross-hatchings had an echo of newsprint – and therefore of meaning.

Not sure I approve of the subject matter these days, having sold my two shotguns some time before we went Greece-wards. Having once had some “pet” pheasants, which I had discovered nesting in a hedge at Moses Farm House, near Lurgashall, I had earnestly foresworn shooting pheasants. But then, some years later, shot one on Little Rissington airfield, in large part because she took me by surprise. Still feel a pang of regret.

The Bank of the West publishes a piece on our thinking about COVID-19 and sustainability.

Wonderful flapping slice of birdlife today as we enjoyed a full team away day in Kew Gardens. A possible new member of the team was with us as we walked by the Palm House. I have long felt that sightings of herons heralds some sort of good fortune – and now glimpsed a heron flapping into a tall tree beyond the Lily House. Then two herons exploded out of the tree, being chased by over 50 parakeets. Elaine managed to take this photograph before they disappeared raucously into the distance.