Window on Lindow – A living Art Trail on a Living Bog

This project had its origins in lockdown in 2020 and was realised between 2022 and 2025

Frozen water and rushes on Lindow Moss
Lindow Moss in winter, several years after peat extraction was halted.

The Lindow Moss area includes a former raised bog which has been severely reduced and damaged from a combination of centuries of peat cutting, the spread of agriculture, development, alterations to drainage, pollution and waste tipping.  The wider area includes Lindow Common, Newgate Nature Reserve, Rossmere and extensive areas in agricultural use still supporting an extensive landscape of Moss Rooms formed by peat cutting.

The whole area is known as Lindow Common or Moss, but this project focuses on the remaining cut-over peat bog also known as Saltersley Moss where Lindow Man was found in 1984 (he’s now in the British Museum). It has been heavily cut for peat, which ceased several years ago and, on 15th February 2022, a dam was installed, catalysing the agreement which anulled the peat extraction permission and replaced it with a commitment to re-establish the bog so that it once again becomes a living sphagnum bog locking up carbon from the atmosphere.

Petrified pine 4,000 years old exposed at the peat surface by the mechanical extraction of peat which ceased in 2018.

My project worked with community to raise awareness of the significance of The Moss, its history, the science around it and the restoration process and used the 40th anniversary of the discovery of Lindow Man on 1st August 1984 as a focus for what became Discover Lindow 2024.

Commencing with the Window on Lindow exhibition running throughout January, February and March 2023, my project was supported AA2A and involved a residency hosted by Contemporary ArtLab at UCLan, where I am still a member. In February 2023 I produced a scoping note for a six month season of celebration during the second half of 2024 spanning the anniversary of Lindow Man’s discovery. This became Discover Lindow 2024

This drawing includes the eleven compartments on Lindow Moss. The colours are from the Restoration Concept Plan. The key:
Red – Heath;
Grey – Intermediate Heath/Bog;
Green – Raised Bog; Blue – Fen;
Dark Green – Retained access track/path.
Looking at the clear ridges and ditches left behind by the peat cutters in the surface of Lindow Moss, in this LIDAR image, I was inspired to draw the ridges using a sand/peat mix gathered from the bog margin.
While on the Moss I collected wood chippings from modern saplings (birch, willow, alder) which have been cut back to clear drainage channels and to provide access for the first stage of restoration. I wondered what the ancient pines would make of the modern, chipped young wood laid out on display in a museum…

Drawings from my first Window on Lindow Exhibition which opened in January 2023. For more drawings see the Gallery and the EXHIBITION CATALOGUE

Invitation to private view of Window on Lindow, 6.30 to 9.00 on Friday 6th January at The Guild for Lifelong Learning, Bourne Street, Wilmslow SK( 5HD. The exhibition opens today and is on until 31st March

Working in partnership with a range of local organisations, including Transition Wilmslow, The Guild for Lifelong Learning and local schools, I developed and installed an out door Art Trail on The Moss as part of the cultural season, which opened on the Summer Solstice, 20th June 2024 and ran until the end of October.

Bog Bodies (Juliette Hamilton) Photo: Chris Hills
Lindow V (Steve Sutton) Photo: Jane Selva
Feel The Weight (Phil Barton)
Caractacus Waving (Rupert Randall) Photo: Georgie Johnson
Window on Lindow (Phil Barton)

More images in the Gallery. WINDOW ON LINDOW ART TRAIL CATALOGUE AND ON SITE LEAFLET.

A substantive evaluation of the Art Trail and it impact was carried out. You will find the SURVERY REPORT HERE.

The third Window On Lindow exhibition was by the five exhibiting artists on the Art Trail (plus a selection of the primary school artists exhibiting) showing work in the gallery at The Guild for Lifelong Learning.

Poster for Outside : Inside Exhibition
Exhibiting artists left to right: Jane Andrews, Phil Barton, Liz Ellis, Steve Sutton
Banners by local primary school artists
Willow basket by Juliette Hamilton
Iron age artifacts carved by Rupert Randall
Spiral sculpture by Steve Sutton (detail)
Autumn Mushrooms (Phil Barton)
Ceramic Fox (Liz Ellis)

The final show – Window on Lindow Through a Lens – was the result of an open call to local people to submit photographs they had taken of the Art Trail. It was shown at The Guild in April/May 2025.

Jane Andrews
John O’Brien
Pauline Handley
Georgie Johnson
Chris Hills
Phil Barton
Anna Riordan

Jane Andrews made three videos about the Art Trail:

Installation of the Art Trail (6.04 minutes)

Meet the Artists: Window on Lindow Art Trail (6.05 minutes)

Window on Lindow: the Art Trail 2024 (11.34 minutes)