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Tree graffiti at Discover

2 April 2012

A section of beech tree showing graffiti from Second World War

A section of beech tree showing graffiti from the Second World War
Image by Chantel Summerfield

In March 2012 I staged one of the 21 interactive exhibits at the University of Bristol Discover 2012 exhibition. This was my first large-scale experience of presenting my PhD research to a general public audience and I found it a fantastic opportunity to share my work with people from a wide variety of backgrounds, from school children to war veterans.

My work focuses on the study of arborglyphs, also known as tree graffiti, created by the military in the 20th century.  By comparing arborglyphs found on the training sites of Salisbury Plain, Wiltshire, with those found near battlefields in Normandy, France, we can get insights into the lives of soldiers as they made their journeys into war.

Part of the fun of working on the stand was learning how to communicate the research to both young and old visitors and across cultures.

Chantel Summerfield
The creation of the exhibit took several weeks of coordination with the University’s Centre for Public Engagement, Landmarc (Ministry of Defence) who provided the beech tree, Yodel, Morgan Motors and Elmwood nursery in Henfield who together supported my exhibit with advice, kindness and generosity, making it all possible. 

The design of the exhibit was simple; it combined metre sections of beech tree placed on plinths of various heights that could be viewed by members of the public whatever their height or age.  The position of the plinths encircled one large plinth that held sections of tree that had archaeological arborglyphs from the Second World War. 

Visitors to the exhibit were invited to make their own carvings into pieces of balsa wood that could potentially identify them in one hundred years’ time, or simply to carve what they felt important, much in the same way a soldier carved into a tree.  They were then able to create a ‘rubbing’ by placing tracing paper over their carving and colouring over it with wax crayons. By attaching their rubbing to the exhibition space visitors could leave behind a part of themselves, just as soldiers did in the woods and forests they fought in.

An elevated view of the front section of the Discover exhibition

An elevated view of the front section of the Discover exhibition
Image by Dane Comerford

On the first two days of the Discover children from primary schools in and around Bristol made organised trips to the exhibition. Working with other colleagues drafted in to help run our stand we quickly realised that not all the children understood some of terminology, such as 'archaeologist' and 'military', which are used routinely in our work nor did they have a comprehensive, or sometimes even basic, understanding of 20th century wars. Part of the fun of working on the stand was learning how to communicate the research to both young and old visitors and across cultures. We were able to tell them about the World Wars beyond what they had learnt in the curriculum.

Personally I found the exhibition exhilarating, challenging and satisfying. The visitors provided me with the opportunity to hear about their perspectives in a way that I would not normally be able to access.

Chantel Summerfield
Some visitors reminisced about the time they had spent in the military and we were able to learn from their experiences. Others seemed amazed at how much information could be obtained from an inanimate object such as a tree. The carvings and rubbings seemed to be a great success as people were able to interpret what they had heard and consider the meanings of the research in their own lives.  

Personally I found the exhibition exhilarating, challenging and satisfying.  The visitors provided me with the opportunity to hear about their perspectives in a way that I would not normally be able to access and I feel that representing my research in this way contributes to the awareness-raising of my discipline within higher education and beyond.

 

 

Chantel Summerfield is studying at the University of Bristol for a PhD in Archaeology and Anthropology

Further information:

Discover was held between 8-10 March 2012 at The Galleries shopping centre,
Broadmead, Bristol, BS1 3XD.
For further information please contact the Centre for Public Engagement
email: cpe-info@bristol.ac.uk tel: +44 (0)117 3318313.