Alex Julyan is a visual artist who has worked in design, production, performance, film and writing. During the last decade her practice has expanded to include collaborations with musicians, dancers, architects, scientists and writers. In 2017 she was appointed The Horniman Museum (London) Artist in Residence working with the musical instrument collection and in 2014 was awarded a three year Wellcome Trust Public Engagement Fellowship.

Based at our Truro campus, Alex worked with Dr Kath Maguire and researchers from the European Centre for Environment and Human Health, members from the Health and Environment Public Engagement group (HEPE) and My Blue Health. My Blue Health is a pan-European research initiative investigating the links between environment, climate and health. The programme is specifically focused on understanding how water-based environments (coasts, canals, lakes, ponds, rivers etc.) can affect health and wellbeing. HEPE is a network of people from across Cornwall who are interested in research and learning about the complex interactions between environments, society and health. They work with Kath and her team to help identify research priorities, plan strategies and communicate results.

Working collaboratively with the above and focusing on the themes of land, water and air, Alex explored emotional attachments and personal meanings that connect people to outdoor places with water.

Discover more about how the fellowship process unfolded in the film below.

At the beginning of December 2019 Alex travelled to Cornwall to meet with Dr Kath Maguire and members of the HEPE group for some initial group discussions at the stunning Heartlands World Heritage site. Here they came together to reflect on research as well as discuss different avenues of exploration for the Creative Fellowship.

__Conversation Cards __

Following discussions from their initial meetings, Alex developed a series of 'Conversation Cards'. The principle behind the cards is for the HEPE group to use them to open up conversations and responses that are nuanced, to make connections between a range of thoughts and responses and to explore different kinds of discourse. They are open-ended and invite experiment.

The majority of the images have nothing directly to do with water, in fact they may be at odds with it, this is deliberate - a way of creating juxtapositions of thought.

A number of dissemnination events including an artist talk with Alex and a meeting of HEPE members to use the conversation cards in person all had to cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Members of HEPE are currently developing two sets of additional conversation cards inspired by Alex's original pilot set of cards.