We are currently pouring our water thoughts into the Brothers’ ears: everything water means to us, everything we know about water, our dreams about water our songs stories myths and legends about water, our experiences of water.  Leeds Canvas would like to hear your water thoughts, do send them us here.

Meanwhile, Wieke Eringa Director of Yorkshire Dance and one of the pilots of Leeds Canvas shares hers ....

In Holland, every child learns to swim aged 5. The logical thing to do when there is so much water around to drown in. Swimming lessons, in the local outdoor pool, meant an uncivilised early rise and freezing to bits!  I adored the long hot summers in swimming pools, rivers, lakes and the sea. Given any spare bit of water and you find a bunch of Dutch people swimming in it. In the winter the fun turned to ice skating: first behind a chair on a wee forest lake, later on speed skates from village to village: drinking hot chocolate or pea soup on the ice. The fear of falling through the ice was instilled with stories and gossip about death: once you fell in you would be trapped and not find the way out. It worked: I stay off the ice whenever in doubt.

In Holland, the constant threat of water was the basis for the development of democracy: the joint fight against the water by small-holders, crofters and farmers was the beginning of shared local governance, as far back as the late middle ages.  Farmers in Holland are not big landowners: each has enough land to run small businesses. These were the people who got together to share resources to protect themselves from floods and build sea defences. The application of technology has come full circle: from trying to control and fence in the mighty rivers, flowing into the country from Germany, there is now an understanding about how to work with rather than against the forces of nature: to give water the space it demands, allowing rivers to overflow when they need to.

In Yorkshire, the water of the rivers and canals is also inextricably connected to our economy and society and our industrial past; but in rather different ways. The Leeds Liverpool canal was used to service the textile industry, itself fuelled by the cotton plantations overseas in Britain’s colonies. We know that Britain’s dominance of the world at the turn of the last century was possible because of its history of Naval might and ruthless colonisation that included centuries of slavery. So the flow of water through the city of Leeds is directly related to the diverse communities living here – but have we ever had a chance to absorb that into a shared consciousness?

Being in water is for me the ultimate sensation of feeling free and young: whilst others might dream of flying, I dream of diving. Nothing makes me feel like a carefree child as much as floating, playing, messing and swimming in water.  In Yorkshire I love swimming in the Wharfe in Appletreewick, in Ingleton Falls or in the sea in Robin Hood’s Bay.  The sounds of a river or the sight of the sea inspire a sense of freedom, relaxation and joy. There is something fundamental about the life giving quality of water.