The Isle of Man is the only entire nation to boast UNESCO Biosphere status, reflecting it is a special place for people and nature. In our regular feature, authors from different walks of Manx life offer a personal perspective on #MyBiosphere.
This month, the 2023/24 Biosphere artist in residence Ali Hodgson writes:
Moving to the Isle of Man was never in my ‘plan’. A perfect storm of life events forced my hand and blew me across the Irish Sea to a strange land filled with myths, wild gorse and salty winds.
When I found myself being driven onto the Steam Packet boat in a borrowed Toyota Aygo, holding back tears as I clutched a one-way ticket and a potted plant, I had no idea what was next.
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A week earlier I had a given birth to a beautiful baby girl, and on that same day I felt her heart beat for the last time and a piece of my heart broke forever too. That wasn’t in the plan either.
But this story isn’t about death, or grief, or loss. In fact, quite the opposite. What the Isle of Man has given me in the few short years I have lived here is more life than I ever could have imagined.
I never really know what to say when people ask me ‘what do you do?’ My background is in the arts, but I’ve always been fascinated in things far bigger than the practical application of my practice: I want to know what we can do to make this world a better place.
I’m interested in ecological design and the more I learn about something called regenerative culture, the more I think ‘this is it’.
Regenerative culture is hard to pin down. Unlike sustainability, it’s not a destination to be understood, reached or ticked off. It’s a way of life, being, doing. Janine Benyus, the godmother of biomimicry, describes it best: ‘life in support of all life’.
Last year I was fortunate enough to be selected as the 2023/24 Biosphere artist in residence - a prestigious year-long position that granted me the time I so desperately craved to help myself and others explore their own understanding of regenerative life in the Isle of Man.
And now, my residency might have drawn to a close but I find myself coming back to what underpins the principles of regenerative culture: ‘life in support of all life’.
The mother in me might have lost a child, but she also knows (without being told) that all the life within our biosphere, and all the life that calls this beautiful island home, is precious. So precious, that it’s absolutely worth mothering, protecting, nurturing and loving fiercely, if we truly want to flourish.