The project features the work of Vanessa Collingridge, Course Leader on the Foundation Diploma in Art and Design, and James Elliott, MA Photography (Online) Programme Leader, alongside artists Tom Hall and Stephanie James. 'In and Out of Bounds' is an ambitious cross-cultural and cross-generational endeavour that delves into the meaning of living within, moving through, and belonging to places defined by boundaries.
It draws parallels between two distinct yet conceptually linked environments: the New Forest in the UK and Venice in Italy. Both locations are presented as 'living museums', environments shaped over centuries by human activity, history, culture, and careful stewardship. They are recognised for their exceptional beauty and strong identities, yet both grapple with contemporary challenges related to tourism, access, opportunities, demographic shifts, heritage preservation, and environmental concerns.
The project commenced with 'Forest Bounds' in the New Forest, where the four artists engaged with local communities through workshops, discussions, research, and creative activities. Collaborating with young people and community groups provided artists with insights into personal experiences of place, identity, and belonging, including perspectives often outside the conventional narratives of the Forest.
These interactions served as a foundation for new artworks addressing themes such as cultural diversity, stewardship, personal journeys, age, ecology, memory, and our connection to the landscapes we inhabit. The project subsequently moved to Venice for its second phase, 'Venice Bound', fostering a dialogue between the research, conversations, and artworks developed in the New Forest and the unique context of the historic island city, with its own distinct communities, identities, and environmental issues.
Vanessa Collingridge's contribution, 'Waymarkers and Memorable Places', originated from participatory workshops with young people in the New Forest. These sessions explored their relationships with the landscape, using collaborative mapping and drawing to consider personal landmarks, significant locations, informal waymarkers, and their usual routes. Discussions touched upon themes of freedom, escape, isolation, belonging, and the boundaries influencing young people's experiences of place.
These encounters informed Collingridge's artistic response, which uses drawing, mapping, printmaking, and material processes to depict the New Forest as a network of memory points and transitional spaces, examining how individual experiences can generate diverse narratives of the same landscape.
James Elliott's project involved close collaboration with Forestry England's wetland restoration team, documenting and responding to their efforts to restore waterways across the forest. For the Venice phase, Elliott focused on a year-long project at the Coppice of Linwood in the northern New Forest. He recorded and responded to the site's transformation, from the initial cutting and clearing in October 2025 to the civil engineering team's work in recreating the historical meandering watercourse.
Elliott noted his initial perception of the New Forest as a pristine wilderness, unaware of its carefully managed nature and the values of stewardship it represents. His artistic responses, including large-scale photographic prints and video, portray the forest as a dynamic, evolving entity and a testament to the care and efforts of past generations.
For both Collingridge and Elliott, exhibiting internationally while maintaining their roles at AUB creates a vital link between professional creative practice and arts education. Their involvement highlights how active research, exhibition, collaboration, and community engagement can directly inform their teaching with emerging artists and designers.
Collingridge stated, “For me, teaching and making are closely connected. Working with students continually challenges me to think differently about materials, processes, research and ideas, while continuing my own practice means I can bring current, real world experiences back into the studio.”
She added, “'In and Out of Bounds' has given us the opportunity to work with communities in the New Forest and then take those conversations and ideas into a completely different international context. What has been particularly important is that the project isn't simply about two landscapes; it's about the people who live within them, the stories they tell and the different ways we experience and remember place.”
At its core, 'In and Out of Bounds' focuses on people and place, questioning whose narratives are heard, how environments evolve, what we choose to protect, and how art can facilitate the sharing of diverse voices and experiences.
