THE charity Hometree’s acclaimed arts project embarks on its first national tour from July 29th – starting with a four-day residency as part of the Skibbereen Arts Festival. Dinnseanchas – the Irish for stories a place is telling – follows a year-long creative journey through upland communities. It brings together exhibitions, film, performance, workshops, walks and conversations that explore our relationship with landscape, culture and nature restoration.

The tour opens at Skibbereen Arts Festival (July 29th – August 2nd), centred around An Scioból at Uillinn: West Cork Arts Centre, before travelling to Inishbofin, Uíbh Ráthach (Co Kerry) and Ennis (Co Clare) later in the year. Created by Hometree, the west of Ireland-based charity dedicated to restoring and protecting Ireland’s temperate rainforests, Dinnseanchas recognises that lasting nature restoration is as much about culture and community as it is about ecology. The touring project invites communities to consider what stories the landscape is telling us through exhibitions, film, performance, conversation and interactive creative workshops. Through art and participatory creative practice, it opens conversations around climate change, biodiversity loss and the social and economic pressures shaping rural Ireland today.

Nature restoration charity Hometree believes that restoring our landscapes is not only an ecological challenge, but a cultural one. At its heart is An Scioból, an immersive exhibition at the Courtyard Gallery featuring photography, film, artworks and artefacts gathered over a year-long creative journey through upland communities from Gartan in Donegal to the Coomhola Valley in West Cork. Around the exhibition, a programme of walks, performances, workshops and conversations will unfold across Skibbereen, its surrounding landscape and Bere Island. David Teevan, Dinnseanchas on Tour curator, said: ‘Dinnseanchas isn’t about presenting finished answers. It’s about creating spaces where people can encounter a place differently and begin asking new questions together. Every community we visit adds another layer to the work, making the project richer, more surprising and deeply rooted in the landscapes and people who shape it.’

Alongside the touring programme, Hometree will launch the Dinnseanchas film this August, documenting the project’s year-long journey across upland communities and capturing how creativity can help communities reimagine their relationship with the natural world. Hometree’s Laura Costello said: ‘Nature restoration isn’t only about restoring habitats. It’s also about restoring our relationship with place. Dinnseanchas creates space for people to slow down, listen differently and imagine what the future of their landscapes could become. Through art, we’re opening conversations that environmental science alone often cannot. Every landscape holds stories, memories and possibilities, and those stories are essential if we’re to build a future where both nature and communities can thrive.’ Full programme at www.hometree.ie/dinnseanchas-project

Restoring our relationship with nature at heart of Hometree’s touring project.