Woodlanders is a collection of 60 photographic portraits by photographer, writer and designer Keith Lovegrove. The photographs were taken over a period of eight years on a sinuous journey through woodlands large and small, ancient and managed, that led inevitably to the doors of those who dwell and work amid the trees.
From the edge of a chestnut coppice to the understorey of ancient woodland emerge the faces and remarkable characters of foresters, coppice workers, craftspeople and residents of the woods across the southern United Kingdom. Lovegrove finds his subjects open, ardent and vital – with a sense of both freedom and rootedness, working and living as they do in a mutually beneficial relationship with their surroundings.
The portraits seek to impart the spirit and essence of creative, highly skilled and enterprising people who are nurturing the seeds of a sustainable future for woodlands everywhere. In its raw and sensitive portrayals, Woodlanders documents those who have answered the vigorous call of the woods and invites us all to recalibrate our view, to adjust to the low light as we are enveloped in the bright spirit of this industrious community.
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'Approaching the entrance to the coppice from the busy public road, the woodland seemed quiet and deserted – a feeling soon dispelled by an enticing hint of woodsmoke hovering in the air as I opened the door of the pick-up to unlock the gate. Following the twists and turns of a rutted track running through a mixture of standing chestnut, younger coppice and mature oak, and the occasional quagmire, we reached a clearing in the trees. A series of bashas roped to chestnut poles served as a temporary shelter from a threatening sky; a blackened iron kettle steamed over a fire as cutters and pale makers felled, split and stacked. What began as a pictorial record of working practices and processes soon developed into a collection of portraits. That small industrious community of exuberant apprentices and their dedicated instructors, their warm welcome and their anecdotes, formed the inspiration for a photographic project that became this book.
I joined in with the monthly meetings of the local coppice cooperative and was soon mixing with woodreeves, coppice workers and woodland owners. Some families go back several generations, with tales of great-grandfathers felling with axes and two-person saws. In chestnut woods in Kent, ancient coppice stools several metres in diameter are a testament to the long life of the trees, extended as they have been by human intervention with the obvious ecological benefits that provides.'
Keith Lovegrove