Paper short abstract:

This paper will examine part of a 10-year ongoing art-based and research project that uses both quantitative and qualitative drawn maps, participatory walks, performances and interviews to engage residents in visioning and implementing urban agriculture (UA) within their neighbourhoods.

Paper long abstract:

This paper will examine part of a 10-year ongoing art-based and research project that uses both quantitative and qualitative drawn maps, participatory walks, performances and go-along interviews to engage residents in visioning and implementing urban agriculture (UA) within their neighbourhoods. Called the 'Edible Map Project', it has been run in several UK cities, including London, Peterborough, and Newcastle as well as internationally in Dallas and Northern Iraq.

The concept involves drawing a spatially accurate map of a city block, populated with imagined examples of UA. The map is used to lead daily walks with small groups of residents to discuss how multiple urban spaces might be repurposed for food production. Other art practices are also engaged such making ceramics for communal meals and costumes to simulate rituals and harvest ceremonies. The aim of the project is threefold. Firstly, to create a vision of UA at a walkable scale in the form of a map. Secondly, using go-along interviews, to capture the opinions of residents in situ. Thirdly, to create moments of implementation and change within neighbourhoods as a legacy of the project.

This paper reports principally on the Newcastle neighbourhood of Shieldfield (2018-2020), where residents have now begun to plant underused land with wheat for bread making. The project stands as an example of how academic and non-academic approaches through creative and participatory practices can create powerful moments of change for communities that can lead from an image to implementation.