#91 The Greatest Blessing

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The following 21 tree stories come from Chengdu , they emerge from the A4 artist residency in September October 2024. A huge thank to A4 artist residency for your support throughout preparations, workshops and recordings. Special thanks to videographer Xiao Qin 晓琴/Vicky and her camera team and of course to all the people who contributed their tree stories here. .

We begin the A4 Tree Stories from Chengdu with story # 91 from an old friend artist Cangxin. He is well known for his relationship with the natural world and is sometimes referred to the Shaman of the Art World here in China.

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Cang Xin’s words:

The Greatest Blessing , told by Cang Xin

My mother is a devout Buddhist.

She has been taking me to release animals since I was young.

She often releases loaches and fish.

She also said that planting trees is the greatest blessing.

Releasing animals and trees is a very great blessing.

So what about my 15 years in Beijing

So I bought 20 trees in Beijing,

It has been 9 years now.

There is Arbor Day every year. It is a big environmental protection and greening event. It‘s just like a child. You plant this tree and then later, it’s like a child is born.

When it gets older , the tree will grow up with the child.

Regarding my favourite tree, it’s the one with purple flowers Jacaranda .

For example, the jacaranda behind you.

When there is clear water and blue sky,

the purple color and its fruit are very psychedelic.

So I think this plant is like our living body like our sperm and eggs.

It is in the most primal initial state. So I think from the Eastern perspective,

it is a type of aesthetic and perspective of happiness and longevity.

So caretaking for animals is good, caretaking for plants is good , it is also a blessing for the Chinese people .

This is my understanding of trees.

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#1 Teardrops After a Storm

#2 Pomegranate Tree

#3 Trees are like Humans

#4 Old Ash – A Real Survivor

#5 Tree Rings of Life

#6 A Very Weird Elf

#7 Old Crabapple of Wenhua Dian

#8 Standing Fast

#9 Feeling Good – Tree Song

#10 Forest Breath – Tree Story

#11 Protective Peach – Tree Story

#12 Bee Tree (Part 1) Sycamore

#13 Winter Apples

#14 Ancient Yew Trees

#15 Once I Counted Birds

#16 Family Oak

#17 When the Trees Say Everything

#18 Strawberry Tree

#19 Mother Oak and Baby Oak

#20 My Leylandii

#21 Chestnut Repotted

#22 Native Birch

#23 Ethan’s Tree

#24 Holding Trunk of Time

#25 Our Mother’s Legacy

#26 It Blossomed

#27 Always Trying To Hold Each Other Up

#28 Wollemi Pine

#29 Barrow Willow

#30 For What We Might Become

#31 Sheltering Beech

#32 Millennium Monkey Puzzle

#33 Monterey Cyprus

#34 Struggle On, Struggle On

#35 Like A Chestnut

#36 Head and Shoulders Above

#37 An Dair Sean

#38 Trees for the Forest

#39 The year 1710

#40 I Feel at Peace

#41 Chongqing Cedar

#42 Unusual Bauhinia

# 43 Bamboo – Munro

#44 St Anne’s Oak

#45 Angie’s Umbrella Tree

# 46 Berna’s Umbrella Tree

#47 Hawthorne , it gives and it gives

#48 Apple Tree Swing

#49 Forest Bathing 1

#50 Forest Bathing 2

#51 Mulberry -when Swiss watches were almost made in Waterford

#52 Prunus Kanzan , double blossom Cherry blossom

#53 Oak We absolutely love it！

#54 Pre-Famine Timber

#55 Slogged Apples

#56 Ash Determined to stay put

#57 Best Apple Tart in Headford

#58 Apple Tree of Clonmel

#59 Horizontal Arbutus Unedo

#60 Euonymus Zones

#61 How big they can get

#62 Autumn Maple

#63 The Magic of Moss

#64 Gallipoli and the Sycamore

#65 Liquid Amber

#66 Hardmount Chestnut

#67 Silver Birch – a gentle lovely ending

#68 Keeping Black Bird Company

#69 Tulip Tree

#70 Itea Iliciafolia

#71 Silver Birch Moonlight

#72 The Shape of it

#73 The Missing Gorilla

#74 The Tree House

#75 Bat Burglars

#76 The Perfect Conker

#77 Ginkgo Biloba and Sweet Gum

#78 Ash The Horse Whisperer

#79 Healers

#80 Fairy Ash

#81 Under the Oak

#82 Date Palm

#83 Willow – Branching out

#84 Tree Bee Hive

# 85 Flaky Bark Birch

# 86 Devine Tree of SanXingdui

#87 Chestnut of Xishan

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Open Call for your just a minute Tree Story on video

Memory Palace of Tree Stories is a socio-ecological art practice which invites you to tell a story or share information about trees . It is a creative-led social enquiry of how we can live well for both personal and collective wellbeing. Your story can be any kind of tree story , a personal tree story, an ecological tree story , an environmental tree story, an historical tree story or even a botanical tree story. I do hope you can contribute a comment on how we can live better with the greater community of life.

The year 2024 we continue to gather your stories in the form of one minute videos and we are really looking forward to hearing your tree story . I can be contacted directly on this platform or on the contact page on this website.

Niamh Cunningham