Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream: Reimagining Art, Nature, Community, and Heritage along London's Waterways
We dive into the art fair transforming London's waterways...
August 15, 2024
Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream reimagines the interconnections between art, nature, community, and heritage. Through the Canal Dream Art Festival (CDAF) that she founded, Chuntian demonstrates how to leverage London's unique waterways to integrate contemporary art into historical sites, fostering social innovation and community engagement. The festival acts as a platform to inspire dialogues between public art and social change, showcasing her distinctive contributions to London's cultural landscape.
A New Model for Water-based Art
This August, the Regent’s Canal in King’s Cross came alive with the CDAF. The week-long event featured a diverse array of exhibitions, film screenings, poetry readings, dance, and music performances, all staged across five boats and a canal-side art space. CD is not just an art festival, it is a dynamic, evolving social innovation project that challenges traditional notions of artistic experience while expanding the possibilities of social innovation. As the founder and director of Canal Dream CIC, Chuntian Hu plays a pivotal role in transforming London's overlooked waterways into vibrant cultural corridors. Originally from China, Chuntian moved to the UK to study Service Design at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2021. After discovering London's unique canal network, she initiated CD as her graduation project and subsequently founded the Canal Dream Community Interest Company. She now resides on a narrowboat along London’s canals and rivers.
Organising a waterborne art festival is fraught with challenges; navigating the boats, coordinating docking, and managing the differing spaces and facilities require meticulous planning. The limited activity space on the canals, along with the instability of the boats and weather fluctuations, presents additional risks. However, the unique and profound rewards of a waterborne art festival are undeniable. The historical context of the canals and boats imbues the artistic activities with a distinctive poetry, allowing audiences to experience art in entirely new settings.
Chuntian's leadership is evident not only in her ability to gather artists and creatives from various disciplines but also in her capacity to bring together stakeholders from sectors such as culture, arts, environment, and education for dialogue and collaboration. She collaborates with organisations like Word on the Water - The London Bookbarge to extend the festival's programming into literature and poetry, and she partners with Global Generation to demonstrate her commitment to sustainability and educational outreach.
CD is a breath of fresh air in both the arts and social innovation sectors. It applies systematic and strategic thinking from service design to exhibition and event planning, illustrating the potential for art to effect social change.
Art as a Tool for Social and Environmental Change
One of the core elements of Chuntian’s work is her belief in art as a medium for social change and environmental awareness. Chuntian arrived in the UK at the end of the pandemic, and the concept of CD emerged in response to the urgent need for reconnection in society post-pandemic. The pandemic had a severe impact on the creative industries, particularly music and performing arts, leaving many feeling isolated and helpless. In this context, CD was born, aiming to reshape social connections through art.
The direction of CD's projects is inspired by three key concepts: art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art. Art prescriptions link individuals with local arts and cultural activities, promoting well-being through creative participation; green prescriptions connect people with nature-based activities; and site-specific art emphasises creating and showcasing artistic works in specific locations, allowing participants to deepen their experiences through the physical and historical context of the place.
Chuntian defined the positioning of CD and drove her practice over the next three years with a pivotal question: “How might we create a range of art-in-nature services on the canal that integrate art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art to foster opportunities for creative practices, community well-being, climate action, and canal regeneration?” Starting from this question, Chuntian began organising activities along the Regent’s Canal. Initially, these activities were small-scale but gradually expanded in scope. Through a series of initiatives, ranging from a simple storytelling workshop featuring paper boats to multidisciplinary art festivals with a fleet, she has cultivated a growing network of creative and canal communities.
Heritage as a Space for Site-Specific Art & Place-based Design
In organising the CDAF, Chuntian emphasises the significance of site-specific art, encouraging artists to engage deeply with the unique space of the canals for their creative expressions. She also calls on the design community to pay attention to these hidden infrastructures and conduct place-based design activities along the waterways. To support this initiative, CD joined the London Design Festival (LDF) in 2023 as an official partner.
Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a Method for Community Engagement and Development
In the development of CD and CDAF, Chuntian effectively employs the key principles of PAR. PAR emphasises the importance of participants' experiences, cultural backgrounds, and unique perspectives in social and cultural projects, advocating for individual reflection and practice to drive collective action and social change. Chuntian demonstrates the application of this theory by integrating her own experiences into the project.
Firstly, Chuntian's cross-cultural background enriches the vision of CDAF. She connects the ancient Chinese tradition of water-based art activities with London’s contemporary canal culture, creating a time-spanning arts festival platform that reflects her personal cultural history. This approach is not merely a retrospective on history; it combines a profound understanding of both cultures with a response to societal needs, resulting in new forms of artistic expression.
Secondly, Chuntian's experience as a boater embodies the spirit of PAR. After two years of involvement in the CD project, she became a narrowboat dweller, a transition that not only altered her daily life but also deeply influenced her perception of nature and waterways. Living on a boat heightened her awareness of water flow, weather changes, seasonal cycles, and the fragile ecosystems along the canal. This unique experience inspired her to focus this year's festival theme on the waterways, with site-specific art and performances that not only showcase the beauty of the canal but also highlight its vulnerability in the context of climate change. Moreover, this experience connected her with a growing network of fellow boater artists, leading her to curate a special exhibition titled “Waterborne: Boater Art” within the festival.
Through self-reflection and practice, Chuntian explores how "art can serve as a tool for social change." She provides opportunities for collective community engagement through art, helping people find cultural and emotional belonging within the canal environment while also establishing a sense of home in a foreign land.
This interplay between self and society embodies the core principles of PAR: an individual's identity, experiences, and reflections are not merely additive values in cultural projects; they are essential drivers of change and sources of innovation. Through her experiences as a boater, her cultural background, and her artistic practice, Chuntian has shaped CDAF into a self-based cultural experiment that reflects her personal growth and deep understanding of the relationships among society, environment, and art.
Waterways as a Pathway for Future Growth, Water as a Medium for Cultural Exchange
Water is the core medium of the CDAF, connecting different cultures and disciplines while acting as a bridge for cross-cultural exchange. Artists create around the theme of water, exploring the relationships between people and nature, history and modernity, thereby fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. At the local festival, water not only symbolises diversity but also promotes connections between art, the environment, and communities.
On the international stage, in 2023, CDAF partnered with the Aranya Theatre Festival in China to launch a water-based artist exchange programme between UK and China. This initiative invited artists from both countries to engage in artistic creation and dialogue through waterways. British artists travelled to the seaside location of Aranya in China, immersing themselves in the local nature and culture; simultaneously, Chinese artists showcased their understanding and expression of water along the canals in London. This cross-cultural artistic exchange not only strengthened collaboration between Chinese and British artists but also transcended language barriers through the shared element of water, allowing their creations to resonate with new meanings and connections within different cultural contexts. In the autumn of 2023, during the LDF, CD hosted a diverse array of activities, including a cultural exchange exhibition Bodies of Water - Vienna Meets London. This event marked another waterway-based cultural exchange, connecting London’s Regent’s Canal with Vienna’s Danube Canal.
Looking ahead, CDAF plans to transform this festival into a linear water-based arts celebration throughout London, from Regent's Canal to the River Lea, with activity centres in places like King’s Cross, Paddington, and Hackney Wick. Through this expansion, CDAF will not only serve as a link connecting various cultural districts in London but also facilitate deep interactions between emerging artists and communities, achieving cross-regional cultural exchanges. The waterways will embody CDAF's vision, gradually weaving a network of innovation along the linear canals. This expansion will attract more young audiences, emerging artists, and participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, reinvigorating London's canals and driving ongoing artistic activities and projects. Additionally, CDAF's expansion plan will deepen its role as a tool for promoting social change, environmental awareness, and cultural revival, propelling future development along the waterways.
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Chuntian's CDAF plays a transformative role in London's culture by seamlessly integrating art, community, and environmental awareness. By utilising the historic waterways, Chuntian redefines artistic engagement and demonstrates how art can serve as a catalyst for social innovation and environmental consciousness. Her background in service design and experience as a narrowboat dweller provide unique perspectives that foster connections between diverse communities.
Chuntian's commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her collaborations with various stakeholders and support for emerging artists. Through projects that incorporate principles of participatory action research, she encourages community involvement and emphasises art as a tool for change. CDAF not only revives the industrial heritage of London's canals but also inspires a new generation of artists and audiences to engage with their environment.
Looking ahead, Chuntian envisions the festival as a water-based celebration of the arts that promotes cross-cultural exchange and deepens community connections. Her vision reshapes the narrative of London's waterways, enhancing their significance as vibrant cultural conduits for the future.
Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream reimagines the interconnections between art, nature, community, and heritage. Through the Canal Dream Art Festival (CDAF) that she founded, Chuntian demonstrates how to leverage London's unique waterways to integrate contemporary art into historical sites, fostering social innovation and community engagement. The festival acts as a platform to inspire dialogues between public art and social change, showcasing her distinctive contributions to London's cultural landscape.
A New Model for Water-based Art
This August, the Regent’s Canal in King’s Cross came alive with the CDAF. The week-long event featured a diverse array of exhibitions, film screenings, poetry readings, dance, and music performances, all staged across five boats and a canal-side art space. CD is not just an art festival, it is a dynamic, evolving social innovation project that challenges traditional notions of artistic experience while expanding the possibilities of social innovation. As the founder and director of Canal Dream CIC, Chuntian Hu plays a pivotal role in transforming London's overlooked waterways into vibrant cultural corridors. Originally from China, Chuntian moved to the UK to study Service Design at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2021. After discovering London's unique canal network, she initiated CD as her graduation project and subsequently founded the Canal Dream Community Interest Company. She now resides on a narrowboat along London’s canals and rivers.
Organising a waterborne art festival is fraught with challenges; navigating the boats, coordinating docking, and managing the differing spaces and facilities require meticulous planning. The limited activity space on the canals, along with the instability of the boats and weather fluctuations, presents additional risks. However, the unique and profound rewards of a waterborne art festival are undeniable. The historical context of the canals and boats imbues the artistic activities with a distinctive poetry, allowing audiences to experience art in entirely new settings.
Chuntian's leadership is evident not only in her ability to gather artists and creatives from various disciplines but also in her capacity to bring together stakeholders from sectors such as culture, arts, environment, and education for dialogue and collaboration. She collaborates with organisations like Word on the Water - The London Bookbarge to extend the festival's programming into literature and poetry, and she partners with Global Generation to demonstrate her commitment to sustainability and educational outreach.
CD is a breath of fresh air in both the arts and social innovation sectors. It applies systematic and strategic thinking from service design to exhibition and event planning, illustrating the potential for art to effect social change.
Art as a Tool for Social and Environmental Change
One of the core elements of Chuntian’s work is her belief in art as a medium for social change and environmental awareness. Chuntian arrived in the UK at the end of the pandemic, and the concept of CD emerged in response to the urgent need for reconnection in society post-pandemic. The pandemic had a severe impact on the creative industries, particularly music and performing arts, leaving many feeling isolated and helpless. In this context, CD was born, aiming to reshape social connections through art.
The direction of CD's projects is inspired by three key concepts: art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art. Art prescriptions link individuals with local arts and cultural activities, promoting well-being through creative participation; green prescriptions connect people with nature-based activities; and site-specific art emphasises creating and showcasing artistic works in specific locations, allowing participants to deepen their experiences through the physical and historical context of the place.
Chuntian defined the positioning of CD and drove her practice over the next three years with a pivotal question: “How might we create a range of art-in-nature services on the canal that integrate art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art to foster opportunities for creative practices, community well-being, climate action, and canal regeneration?” Starting from this question, Chuntian began organising activities along the Regent’s Canal. Initially, these activities were small-scale but gradually expanded in scope. Through a series of initiatives, ranging from a simple storytelling workshop featuring paper boats to multidisciplinary art festivals with a fleet, she has cultivated a growing network of creative and canal communities.
Heritage as a Space for Site-Specific Art & Place-based Design
In organising the CDAF, Chuntian emphasises the significance of site-specific art, encouraging artists to engage deeply with the unique space of the canals for their creative expressions. She also calls on the design community to pay attention to these hidden infrastructures and conduct place-based design activities along the waterways. To support this initiative, CD joined the London Design Festival (LDF) in 2023 as an official partner.
Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a Method for Community Engagement and Development
In the development of CD and CDAF, Chuntian effectively employs the key principles of PAR. PAR emphasises the importance of participants' experiences, cultural backgrounds, and unique perspectives in social and cultural projects, advocating for individual reflection and practice to drive collective action and social change. Chuntian demonstrates the application of this theory by integrating her own experiences into the project.
Firstly, Chuntian's cross-cultural background enriches the vision of CDAF. She connects the ancient Chinese tradition of water-based art activities with London’s contemporary canal culture, creating a time-spanning arts festival platform that reflects her personal cultural history. This approach is not merely a retrospective on history; it combines a profound understanding of both cultures with a response to societal needs, resulting in new forms of artistic expression.
Secondly, Chuntian's experience as a boater embodies the spirit of PAR. After two years of involvement in the CD project, she became a narrowboat dweller, a transition that not only altered her daily life but also deeply influenced her perception of nature and waterways. Living on a boat heightened her awareness of water flow, weather changes, seasonal cycles, and the fragile ecosystems along the canal. This unique experience inspired her to focus this year's festival theme on the waterways, with site-specific art and performances that not only showcase the beauty of the canal but also highlight its vulnerability in the context of climate change. Moreover, this experience connected her with a growing network of fellow boater artists, leading her to curate a special exhibition titled “Waterborne: Boater Art” within the festival.
Through self-reflection and practice, Chuntian explores how "art can serve as a tool for social change." She provides opportunities for collective community engagement through art, helping people find cultural and emotional belonging within the canal environment while also establishing a sense of home in a foreign land.
This interplay between self and society embodies the core principles of PAR: an individual's identity, experiences, and reflections are not merely additive values in cultural projects; they are essential drivers of change and sources of innovation. Through her experiences as a boater, her cultural background, and her artistic practice, Chuntian has shaped CDAF into a self-based cultural experiment that reflects her personal growth and deep understanding of the relationships among society, environment, and art.
Waterways as a Pathway for Future Growth, Water as a Medium for Cultural Exchange
Water is the core medium of the CDAF, connecting different cultures and disciplines while acting as a bridge for cross-cultural exchange. Artists create around the theme of water, exploring the relationships between people and nature, history and modernity, thereby fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. At the local festival, water not only symbolises diversity but also promotes connections between art, the environment, and communities.
On the international stage, in 2023, CDAF partnered with the Aranya Theatre Festival in China to launch a water-based artist exchange programme between UK and China. This initiative invited artists from both countries to engage in artistic creation and dialogue through waterways. British artists travelled to the seaside location of Aranya in China, immersing themselves in the local nature and culture; simultaneously, Chinese artists showcased their understanding and expression of water along the canals in London. This cross-cultural artistic exchange not only strengthened collaboration between Chinese and British artists but also transcended language barriers through the shared element of water, allowing their creations to resonate with new meanings and connections within different cultural contexts. In the autumn of 2023, during the LDF, CD hosted a diverse array of activities, including a cultural exchange exhibition Bodies of Water - Vienna Meets London. This event marked another waterway-based cultural exchange, connecting London’s Regent’s Canal with Vienna’s Danube Canal.
Looking ahead, CDAF plans to transform this festival into a linear water-based arts celebration throughout London, from Regent's Canal to the River Lea, with activity centres in places like King’s Cross, Paddington, and Hackney Wick. Through this expansion, CDAF will not only serve as a link connecting various cultural districts in London but also facilitate deep interactions between emerging artists and communities, achieving cross-regional cultural exchanges. The waterways will embody CDAF's vision, gradually weaving a network of innovation along the linear canals. This expansion will attract more young audiences, emerging artists, and participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, reinvigorating London's canals and driving ongoing artistic activities and projects. Additionally, CDAF's expansion plan will deepen its role as a tool for promoting social change, environmental awareness, and cultural revival, propelling future development along the waterways.
Chuntian's CDAF plays a transformative role in London's culture by seamlessly integrating art, community, and environmental awareness. By utilising the historic waterways, Chuntian redefines artistic engagement and demonstrates how art can serve as a catalyst for social innovation and environmental consciousness. Her background in service design and experience as a narrowboat dweller provide unique perspectives that foster connections between diverse communities.
Chuntian's commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her collaborations with various stakeholders and support for emerging artists. Through projects that incorporate principles of participatory action research, she encourages community involvement and emphasises art as a tool for change. CDAF not only revives the industrial heritage of London's canals but also inspires a new generation of artists and audiences to engage with their environment.
Looking ahead, Chuntian envisions the festival as a water-based celebration of the arts that promotes cross-cultural exchange and deepens community connections. Her vision reshapes the narrative of London's waterways, enhancing their significance as vibrant cultural conduits for the future.
Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream reimagines the interconnections between art, nature, community, and heritage. Through the Canal Dream Art Festival (CDAF) that she founded, Chuntian demonstrates how to leverage London's unique waterways to integrate contemporary art into historical sites, fostering social innovation and community engagement. The festival acts as a platform to inspire dialogues between public art and social change, showcasing her distinctive contributions to London's cultural landscape.
A New Model for Water-based Art
This August, the Regent’s Canal in King’s Cross came alive with the CDAF. The week-long event featured a diverse array of exhibitions, film screenings, poetry readings, dance, and music performances, all staged across five boats and a canal-side art space. CD is not just an art festival, it is a dynamic, evolving social innovation project that challenges traditional notions of artistic experience while expanding the possibilities of social innovation. As the founder and director of Canal Dream CIC, Chuntian Hu plays a pivotal role in transforming London's overlooked waterways into vibrant cultural corridors. Originally from China, Chuntian moved to the UK to study Service Design at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2021. After discovering London's unique canal network, she initiated CD as her graduation project and subsequently founded the Canal Dream Community Interest Company. She now resides on a narrowboat along London’s canals and rivers.
Organising a waterborne art festival is fraught with challenges; navigating the boats, coordinating docking, and managing the differing spaces and facilities require meticulous planning. The limited activity space on the canals, along with the instability of the boats and weather fluctuations, presents additional risks. However, the unique and profound rewards of a waterborne art festival are undeniable. The historical context of the canals and boats imbues the artistic activities with a distinctive poetry, allowing audiences to experience art in entirely new settings.
Chuntian's leadership is evident not only in her ability to gather artists and creatives from various disciplines but also in her capacity to bring together stakeholders from sectors such as culture, arts, environment, and education for dialogue and collaboration. She collaborates with organisations like Word on the Water - The London Bookbarge to extend the festival's programming into literature and poetry, and she partners with Global Generation to demonstrate her commitment to sustainability and educational outreach.
CD is a breath of fresh air in both the arts and social innovation sectors. It applies systematic and strategic thinking from service design to exhibition and event planning, illustrating the potential for art to effect social change.
Art as a Tool for Social and Environmental Change
One of the core elements of Chuntian’s work is her belief in art as a medium for social change and environmental awareness. Chuntian arrived in the UK at the end of the pandemic, and the concept of CD emerged in response to the urgent need for reconnection in society post-pandemic. The pandemic had a severe impact on the creative industries, particularly music and performing arts, leaving many feeling isolated and helpless. In this context, CD was born, aiming to reshape social connections through art.
The direction of CD's projects is inspired by three key concepts: art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art. Art prescriptions link individuals with local arts and cultural activities, promoting well-being through creative participation; green prescriptions connect people with nature-based activities; and site-specific art emphasises creating and showcasing artistic works in specific locations, allowing participants to deepen their experiences through the physical and historical context of the place.
Chuntian defined the positioning of CD and drove her practice over the next three years with a pivotal question: “How might we create a range of art-in-nature services on the canal that integrate art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art to foster opportunities for creative practices, community well-being, climate action, and canal regeneration?” Starting from this question, Chuntian began organising activities along the Regent’s Canal. Initially, these activities were small-scale but gradually expanded in scope. Through a series of initiatives, ranging from a simple storytelling workshop featuring paper boats to multidisciplinary art festivals with a fleet, she has cultivated a growing network of creative and canal communities.
Heritage as a Space for Site-Specific Art & Place-based Design
In organising the CDAF, Chuntian emphasises the significance of site-specific art, encouraging artists to engage deeply with the unique space of the canals for their creative expressions. She also calls on the design community to pay attention to these hidden infrastructures and conduct place-based design activities along the waterways. To support this initiative, CD joined the London Design Festival (LDF) in 2023 as an official partner.
Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a Method for Community Engagement and Development
In the development of CD and CDAF, Chuntian effectively employs the key principles of PAR. PAR emphasises the importance of participants' experiences, cultural backgrounds, and unique perspectives in social and cultural projects, advocating for individual reflection and practice to drive collective action and social change. Chuntian demonstrates the application of this theory by integrating her own experiences into the project.
Firstly, Chuntian's cross-cultural background enriches the vision of CDAF. She connects the ancient Chinese tradition of water-based art activities with London’s contemporary canal culture, creating a time-spanning arts festival platform that reflects her personal cultural history. This approach is not merely a retrospective on history; it combines a profound understanding of both cultures with a response to societal needs, resulting in new forms of artistic expression.
Secondly, Chuntian's experience as a boater embodies the spirit of PAR. After two years of involvement in the CD project, she became a narrowboat dweller, a transition that not only altered her daily life but also deeply influenced her perception of nature and waterways. Living on a boat heightened her awareness of water flow, weather changes, seasonal cycles, and the fragile ecosystems along the canal. This unique experience inspired her to focus this year's festival theme on the waterways, with site-specific art and performances that not only showcase the beauty of the canal but also highlight its vulnerability in the context of climate change. Moreover, this experience connected her with a growing network of fellow boater artists, leading her to curate a special exhibition titled “Waterborne: Boater Art” within the festival.
Through self-reflection and practice, Chuntian explores how "art can serve as a tool for social change." She provides opportunities for collective community engagement through art, helping people find cultural and emotional belonging within the canal environment while also establishing a sense of home in a foreign land.
This interplay between self and society embodies the core principles of PAR: an individual's identity, experiences, and reflections are not merely additive values in cultural projects; they are essential drivers of change and sources of innovation. Through her experiences as a boater, her cultural background, and her artistic practice, Chuntian has shaped CDAF into a self-based cultural experiment that reflects her personal growth and deep understanding of the relationships among society, environment, and art.
Waterways as a Pathway for Future Growth, Water as a Medium for Cultural Exchange
Water is the core medium of the CDAF, connecting different cultures and disciplines while acting as a bridge for cross-cultural exchange. Artists create around the theme of water, exploring the relationships between people and nature, history and modernity, thereby fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. At the local festival, water not only symbolises diversity but also promotes connections between art, the environment, and communities.
On the international stage, in 2023, CDAF partnered with the Aranya Theatre Festival in China to launch a water-based artist exchange programme between UK and China. This initiative invited artists from both countries to engage in artistic creation and dialogue through waterways. British artists travelled to the seaside location of Aranya in China, immersing themselves in the local nature and culture; simultaneously, Chinese artists showcased their understanding and expression of water along the canals in London. This cross-cultural artistic exchange not only strengthened collaboration between Chinese and British artists but also transcended language barriers through the shared element of water, allowing their creations to resonate with new meanings and connections within different cultural contexts. In the autumn of 2023, during the LDF, CD hosted a diverse array of activities, including a cultural exchange exhibition Bodies of Water - Vienna Meets London. This event marked another waterway-based cultural exchange, connecting London’s Regent’s Canal with Vienna’s Danube Canal.
Looking ahead, CDAF plans to transform this festival into a linear water-based arts celebration throughout London, from Regent's Canal to the River Lea, with activity centres in places like King’s Cross, Paddington, and Hackney Wick. Through this expansion, CDAF will not only serve as a link connecting various cultural districts in London but also facilitate deep interactions between emerging artists and communities, achieving cross-regional cultural exchanges. The waterways will embody CDAF's vision, gradually weaving a network of innovation along the linear canals. This expansion will attract more young audiences, emerging artists, and participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, reinvigorating London's canals and driving ongoing artistic activities and projects. Additionally, CDAF's expansion plan will deepen its role as a tool for promoting social change, environmental awareness, and cultural revival, propelling future development along the waterways.
Chuntian's CDAF plays a transformative role in London's culture by seamlessly integrating art, community, and environmental awareness. By utilising the historic waterways, Chuntian redefines artistic engagement and demonstrates how art can serve as a catalyst for social innovation and environmental consciousness. Her background in service design and experience as a narrowboat dweller provide unique perspectives that foster connections between diverse communities.
Chuntian's commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her collaborations with various stakeholders and support for emerging artists. Through projects that incorporate principles of participatory action research, she encourages community involvement and emphasises art as a tool for change. CDAF not only revives the industrial heritage of London's canals but also inspires a new generation of artists and audiences to engage with their environment.
Looking ahead, Chuntian envisions the festival as a water-based celebration of the arts that promotes cross-cultural exchange and deepens community connections. Her vision reshapes the narrative of London's waterways, enhancing their significance as vibrant cultural conduits for the future.
Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream reimagines the interconnections between art, nature, community, and heritage. Through the Canal Dream Art Festival (CDAF) that she founded, Chuntian demonstrates how to leverage London's unique waterways to integrate contemporary art into historical sites, fostering social innovation and community engagement. The festival acts as a platform to inspire dialogues between public art and social change, showcasing her distinctive contributions to London's cultural landscape.
A New Model for Water-based Art
This August, the Regent’s Canal in King’s Cross came alive with the CDAF. The week-long event featured a diverse array of exhibitions, film screenings, poetry readings, dance, and music performances, all staged across five boats and a canal-side art space. CD is not just an art festival, it is a dynamic, evolving social innovation project that challenges traditional notions of artistic experience while expanding the possibilities of social innovation. As the founder and director of Canal Dream CIC, Chuntian Hu plays a pivotal role in transforming London's overlooked waterways into vibrant cultural corridors. Originally from China, Chuntian moved to the UK to study Service Design at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2021. After discovering London's unique canal network, she initiated CD as her graduation project and subsequently founded the Canal Dream Community Interest Company. She now resides on a narrowboat along London’s canals and rivers.
Organising a waterborne art festival is fraught with challenges; navigating the boats, coordinating docking, and managing the differing spaces and facilities require meticulous planning. The limited activity space on the canals, along with the instability of the boats and weather fluctuations, presents additional risks. However, the unique and profound rewards of a waterborne art festival are undeniable. The historical context of the canals and boats imbues the artistic activities with a distinctive poetry, allowing audiences to experience art in entirely new settings.
Chuntian's leadership is evident not only in her ability to gather artists and creatives from various disciplines but also in her capacity to bring together stakeholders from sectors such as culture, arts, environment, and education for dialogue and collaboration. She collaborates with organisations like Word on the Water - The London Bookbarge to extend the festival's programming into literature and poetry, and she partners with Global Generation to demonstrate her commitment to sustainability and educational outreach.
CD is a breath of fresh air in both the arts and social innovation sectors. It applies systematic and strategic thinking from service design to exhibition and event planning, illustrating the potential for art to effect social change.
Art as a Tool for Social and Environmental Change
One of the core elements of Chuntian’s work is her belief in art as a medium for social change and environmental awareness. Chuntian arrived in the UK at the end of the pandemic, and the concept of CD emerged in response to the urgent need for reconnection in society post-pandemic. The pandemic had a severe impact on the creative industries, particularly music and performing arts, leaving many feeling isolated and helpless. In this context, CD was born, aiming to reshape social connections through art.
The direction of CD's projects is inspired by three key concepts: art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art. Art prescriptions link individuals with local arts and cultural activities, promoting well-being through creative participation; green prescriptions connect people with nature-based activities; and site-specific art emphasises creating and showcasing artistic works in specific locations, allowing participants to deepen their experiences through the physical and historical context of the place.
Chuntian defined the positioning of CD and drove her practice over the next three years with a pivotal question: “How might we create a range of art-in-nature services on the canal that integrate art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art to foster opportunities for creative practices, community well-being, climate action, and canal regeneration?” Starting from this question, Chuntian began organising activities along the Regent’s Canal. Initially, these activities were small-scale but gradually expanded in scope. Through a series of initiatives, ranging from a simple storytelling workshop featuring paper boats to multidisciplinary art festivals with a fleet, she has cultivated a growing network of creative and canal communities.
Heritage as a Space for Site-Specific Art & Place-based Design
In organising the CDAF, Chuntian emphasises the significance of site-specific art, encouraging artists to engage deeply with the unique space of the canals for their creative expressions. She also calls on the design community to pay attention to these hidden infrastructures and conduct place-based design activities along the waterways. To support this initiative, CD joined the London Design Festival (LDF) in 2023 as an official partner.
Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a Method for Community Engagement and Development
In the development of CD and CDAF, Chuntian effectively employs the key principles of PAR. PAR emphasises the importance of participants' experiences, cultural backgrounds, and unique perspectives in social and cultural projects, advocating for individual reflection and practice to drive collective action and social change. Chuntian demonstrates the application of this theory by integrating her own experiences into the project.
Firstly, Chuntian's cross-cultural background enriches the vision of CDAF. She connects the ancient Chinese tradition of water-based art activities with London’s contemporary canal culture, creating a time-spanning arts festival platform that reflects her personal cultural history. This approach is not merely a retrospective on history; it combines a profound understanding of both cultures with a response to societal needs, resulting in new forms of artistic expression.
Secondly, Chuntian's experience as a boater embodies the spirit of PAR. After two years of involvement in the CD project, she became a narrowboat dweller, a transition that not only altered her daily life but also deeply influenced her perception of nature and waterways. Living on a boat heightened her awareness of water flow, weather changes, seasonal cycles, and the fragile ecosystems along the canal. This unique experience inspired her to focus this year's festival theme on the waterways, with site-specific art and performances that not only showcase the beauty of the canal but also highlight its vulnerability in the context of climate change. Moreover, this experience connected her with a growing network of fellow boater artists, leading her to curate a special exhibition titled “Waterborne: Boater Art” within the festival.
Through self-reflection and practice, Chuntian explores how "art can serve as a tool for social change." She provides opportunities for collective community engagement through art, helping people find cultural and emotional belonging within the canal environment while also establishing a sense of home in a foreign land.
This interplay between self and society embodies the core principles of PAR: an individual's identity, experiences, and reflections are not merely additive values in cultural projects; they are essential drivers of change and sources of innovation. Through her experiences as a boater, her cultural background, and her artistic practice, Chuntian has shaped CDAF into a self-based cultural experiment that reflects her personal growth and deep understanding of the relationships among society, environment, and art.
Waterways as a Pathway for Future Growth, Water as a Medium for Cultural Exchange
Water is the core medium of the CDAF, connecting different cultures and disciplines while acting as a bridge for cross-cultural exchange. Artists create around the theme of water, exploring the relationships between people and nature, history and modernity, thereby fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. At the local festival, water not only symbolises diversity but also promotes connections between art, the environment, and communities.
On the international stage, in 2023, CDAF partnered with the Aranya Theatre Festival in China to launch a water-based artist exchange programme between UK and China. This initiative invited artists from both countries to engage in artistic creation and dialogue through waterways. British artists travelled to the seaside location of Aranya in China, immersing themselves in the local nature and culture; simultaneously, Chinese artists showcased their understanding and expression of water along the canals in London. This cross-cultural artistic exchange not only strengthened collaboration between Chinese and British artists but also transcended language barriers through the shared element of water, allowing their creations to resonate with new meanings and connections within different cultural contexts. In the autumn of 2023, during the LDF, CD hosted a diverse array of activities, including a cultural exchange exhibition Bodies of Water - Vienna Meets London. This event marked another waterway-based cultural exchange, connecting London’s Regent’s Canal with Vienna’s Danube Canal.
Looking ahead, CDAF plans to transform this festival into a linear water-based arts celebration throughout London, from Regent's Canal to the River Lea, with activity centres in places like King’s Cross, Paddington, and Hackney Wick. Through this expansion, CDAF will not only serve as a link connecting various cultural districts in London but also facilitate deep interactions between emerging artists and communities, achieving cross-regional cultural exchanges. The waterways will embody CDAF's vision, gradually weaving a network of innovation along the linear canals. This expansion will attract more young audiences, emerging artists, and participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, reinvigorating London's canals and driving ongoing artistic activities and projects. Additionally, CDAF's expansion plan will deepen its role as a tool for promoting social change, environmental awareness, and cultural revival, propelling future development along the waterways.
Chuntian's CDAF plays a transformative role in London's culture by seamlessly integrating art, community, and environmental awareness. By utilising the historic waterways, Chuntian redefines artistic engagement and demonstrates how art can serve as a catalyst for social innovation and environmental consciousness. Her background in service design and experience as a narrowboat dweller provide unique perspectives that foster connections between diverse communities.
Chuntian's commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her collaborations with various stakeholders and support for emerging artists. Through projects that incorporate principles of participatory action research, she encourages community involvement and emphasises art as a tool for change. CDAF not only revives the industrial heritage of London's canals but also inspires a new generation of artists and audiences to engage with their environment.
Looking ahead, Chuntian envisions the festival as a water-based celebration of the arts that promotes cross-cultural exchange and deepens community connections. Her vision reshapes the narrative of London's waterways, enhancing their significance as vibrant cultural conduits for the future.
Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream reimagines the interconnections between art, nature, community, and heritage. Through the Canal Dream Art Festival (CDAF) that she founded, Chuntian demonstrates how to leverage London's unique waterways to integrate contemporary art into historical sites, fostering social innovation and community engagement. The festival acts as a platform to inspire dialogues between public art and social change, showcasing her distinctive contributions to London's cultural landscape.
A New Model for Water-based Art
This August, the Regent’s Canal in King’s Cross came alive with the CDAF. The week-long event featured a diverse array of exhibitions, film screenings, poetry readings, dance, and music performances, all staged across five boats and a canal-side art space. CD is not just an art festival, it is a dynamic, evolving social innovation project that challenges traditional notions of artistic experience while expanding the possibilities of social innovation. As the founder and director of Canal Dream CIC, Chuntian Hu plays a pivotal role in transforming London's overlooked waterways into vibrant cultural corridors. Originally from China, Chuntian moved to the UK to study Service Design at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2021. After discovering London's unique canal network, she initiated CD as her graduation project and subsequently founded the Canal Dream Community Interest Company. She now resides on a narrowboat along London’s canals and rivers.
Organising a waterborne art festival is fraught with challenges; navigating the boats, coordinating docking, and managing the differing spaces and facilities require meticulous planning. The limited activity space on the canals, along with the instability of the boats and weather fluctuations, presents additional risks. However, the unique and profound rewards of a waterborne art festival are undeniable. The historical context of the canals and boats imbues the artistic activities with a distinctive poetry, allowing audiences to experience art in entirely new settings.
Chuntian's leadership is evident not only in her ability to gather artists and creatives from various disciplines but also in her capacity to bring together stakeholders from sectors such as culture, arts, environment, and education for dialogue and collaboration. She collaborates with organisations like Word on the Water - The London Bookbarge to extend the festival's programming into literature and poetry, and she partners with Global Generation to demonstrate her commitment to sustainability and educational outreach.
CD is a breath of fresh air in both the arts and social innovation sectors. It applies systematic and strategic thinking from service design to exhibition and event planning, illustrating the potential for art to effect social change.
Art as a Tool for Social and Environmental Change
One of the core elements of Chuntian’s work is her belief in art as a medium for social change and environmental awareness. Chuntian arrived in the UK at the end of the pandemic, and the concept of CD emerged in response to the urgent need for reconnection in society post-pandemic. The pandemic had a severe impact on the creative industries, particularly music and performing arts, leaving many feeling isolated and helpless. In this context, CD was born, aiming to reshape social connections through art.
The direction of CD's projects is inspired by three key concepts: art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art. Art prescriptions link individuals with local arts and cultural activities, promoting well-being through creative participation; green prescriptions connect people with nature-based activities; and site-specific art emphasises creating and showcasing artistic works in specific locations, allowing participants to deepen their experiences through the physical and historical context of the place.
Chuntian defined the positioning of CD and drove her practice over the next three years with a pivotal question: “How might we create a range of art-in-nature services on the canal that integrate art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art to foster opportunities for creative practices, community well-being, climate action, and canal regeneration?” Starting from this question, Chuntian began organising activities along the Regent’s Canal. Initially, these activities were small-scale but gradually expanded in scope. Through a series of initiatives, ranging from a simple storytelling workshop featuring paper boats to multidisciplinary art festivals with a fleet, she has cultivated a growing network of creative and canal communities.
Heritage as a Space for Site-Specific Art & Place-based Design
In organising the CDAF, Chuntian emphasises the significance of site-specific art, encouraging artists to engage deeply with the unique space of the canals for their creative expressions. She also calls on the design community to pay attention to these hidden infrastructures and conduct place-based design activities along the waterways. To support this initiative, CD joined the London Design Festival (LDF) in 2023 as an official partner.
Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a Method for Community Engagement and Development
In the development of CD and CDAF, Chuntian effectively employs the key principles of PAR. PAR emphasises the importance of participants' experiences, cultural backgrounds, and unique perspectives in social and cultural projects, advocating for individual reflection and practice to drive collective action and social change. Chuntian demonstrates the application of this theory by integrating her own experiences into the project.
Firstly, Chuntian's cross-cultural background enriches the vision of CDAF. She connects the ancient Chinese tradition of water-based art activities with London’s contemporary canal culture, creating a time-spanning arts festival platform that reflects her personal cultural history. This approach is not merely a retrospective on history; it combines a profound understanding of both cultures with a response to societal needs, resulting in new forms of artistic expression.
Secondly, Chuntian's experience as a boater embodies the spirit of PAR. After two years of involvement in the CD project, she became a narrowboat dweller, a transition that not only altered her daily life but also deeply influenced her perception of nature and waterways. Living on a boat heightened her awareness of water flow, weather changes, seasonal cycles, and the fragile ecosystems along the canal. This unique experience inspired her to focus this year's festival theme on the waterways, with site-specific art and performances that not only showcase the beauty of the canal but also highlight its vulnerability in the context of climate change. Moreover, this experience connected her with a growing network of fellow boater artists, leading her to curate a special exhibition titled “Waterborne: Boater Art” within the festival.
Through self-reflection and practice, Chuntian explores how "art can serve as a tool for social change." She provides opportunities for collective community engagement through art, helping people find cultural and emotional belonging within the canal environment while also establishing a sense of home in a foreign land.
This interplay between self and society embodies the core principles of PAR: an individual's identity, experiences, and reflections are not merely additive values in cultural projects; they are essential drivers of change and sources of innovation. Through her experiences as a boater, her cultural background, and her artistic practice, Chuntian has shaped CDAF into a self-based cultural experiment that reflects her personal growth and deep understanding of the relationships among society, environment, and art.
Waterways as a Pathway for Future Growth, Water as a Medium for Cultural Exchange
Water is the core medium of the CDAF, connecting different cultures and disciplines while acting as a bridge for cross-cultural exchange. Artists create around the theme of water, exploring the relationships between people and nature, history and modernity, thereby fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. At the local festival, water not only symbolises diversity but also promotes connections between art, the environment, and communities.
On the international stage, in 2023, CDAF partnered with the Aranya Theatre Festival in China to launch a water-based artist exchange programme between UK and China. This initiative invited artists from both countries to engage in artistic creation and dialogue through waterways. British artists travelled to the seaside location of Aranya in China, immersing themselves in the local nature and culture; simultaneously, Chinese artists showcased their understanding and expression of water along the canals in London. This cross-cultural artistic exchange not only strengthened collaboration between Chinese and British artists but also transcended language barriers through the shared element of water, allowing their creations to resonate with new meanings and connections within different cultural contexts. In the autumn of 2023, during the LDF, CD hosted a diverse array of activities, including a cultural exchange exhibition Bodies of Water - Vienna Meets London. This event marked another waterway-based cultural exchange, connecting London’s Regent’s Canal with Vienna’s Danube Canal.
Looking ahead, CDAF plans to transform this festival into a linear water-based arts celebration throughout London, from Regent's Canal to the River Lea, with activity centres in places like King’s Cross, Paddington, and Hackney Wick. Through this expansion, CDAF will not only serve as a link connecting various cultural districts in London but also facilitate deep interactions between emerging artists and communities, achieving cross-regional cultural exchanges. The waterways will embody CDAF's vision, gradually weaving a network of innovation along the linear canals. This expansion will attract more young audiences, emerging artists, and participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, reinvigorating London's canals and driving ongoing artistic activities and projects. Additionally, CDAF's expansion plan will deepen its role as a tool for promoting social change, environmental awareness, and cultural revival, propelling future development along the waterways.
Chuntian's CDAF plays a transformative role in London's culture by seamlessly integrating art, community, and environmental awareness. By utilising the historic waterways, Chuntian redefines artistic engagement and demonstrates how art can serve as a catalyst for social innovation and environmental consciousness. Her background in service design and experience as a narrowboat dweller provide unique perspectives that foster connections between diverse communities.
Chuntian's commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her collaborations with various stakeholders and support for emerging artists. Through projects that incorporate principles of participatory action research, she encourages community involvement and emphasises art as a tool for change. CDAF not only revives the industrial heritage of London's canals but also inspires a new generation of artists and audiences to engage with their environment.
Looking ahead, Chuntian envisions the festival as a water-based celebration of the arts that promotes cross-cultural exchange and deepens community connections. Her vision reshapes the narrative of London's waterways, enhancing their significance as vibrant cultural conduits for the future.
Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream reimagines the interconnections between art, nature, community, and heritage. Through the Canal Dream Art Festival (CDAF) that she founded, Chuntian demonstrates how to leverage London's unique waterways to integrate contemporary art into historical sites, fostering social innovation and community engagement. The festival acts as a platform to inspire dialogues between public art and social change, showcasing her distinctive contributions to London's cultural landscape.
A New Model for Water-based Art
This August, the Regent’s Canal in King’s Cross came alive with the CDAF. The week-long event featured a diverse array of exhibitions, film screenings, poetry readings, dance, and music performances, all staged across five boats and a canal-side art space. CD is not just an art festival, it is a dynamic, evolving social innovation project that challenges traditional notions of artistic experience while expanding the possibilities of social innovation. As the founder and director of Canal Dream CIC, Chuntian Hu plays a pivotal role in transforming London's overlooked waterways into vibrant cultural corridors. Originally from China, Chuntian moved to the UK to study Service Design at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2021. After discovering London's unique canal network, she initiated CD as her graduation project and subsequently founded the Canal Dream Community Interest Company. She now resides on a narrowboat along London’s canals and rivers.
Organising a waterborne art festival is fraught with challenges; navigating the boats, coordinating docking, and managing the differing spaces and facilities require meticulous planning. The limited activity space on the canals, along with the instability of the boats and weather fluctuations, presents additional risks. However, the unique and profound rewards of a waterborne art festival are undeniable. The historical context of the canals and boats imbues the artistic activities with a distinctive poetry, allowing audiences to experience art in entirely new settings.
Chuntian's leadership is evident not only in her ability to gather artists and creatives from various disciplines but also in her capacity to bring together stakeholders from sectors such as culture, arts, environment, and education for dialogue and collaboration. She collaborates with organisations like Word on the Water - The London Bookbarge to extend the festival's programming into literature and poetry, and she partners with Global Generation to demonstrate her commitment to sustainability and educational outreach.
CD is a breath of fresh air in both the arts and social innovation sectors. It applies systematic and strategic thinking from service design to exhibition and event planning, illustrating the potential for art to effect social change.
Art as a Tool for Social and Environmental Change
One of the core elements of Chuntian’s work is her belief in art as a medium for social change and environmental awareness. Chuntian arrived in the UK at the end of the pandemic, and the concept of CD emerged in response to the urgent need for reconnection in society post-pandemic. The pandemic had a severe impact on the creative industries, particularly music and performing arts, leaving many feeling isolated and helpless. In this context, CD was born, aiming to reshape social connections through art.
The direction of CD's projects is inspired by three key concepts: art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art. Art prescriptions link individuals with local arts and cultural activities, promoting well-being through creative participation; green prescriptions connect people with nature-based activities; and site-specific art emphasises creating and showcasing artistic works in specific locations, allowing participants to deepen their experiences through the physical and historical context of the place.
Chuntian defined the positioning of CD and drove her practice over the next three years with a pivotal question: “How might we create a range of art-in-nature services on the canal that integrate art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art to foster opportunities for creative practices, community well-being, climate action, and canal regeneration?” Starting from this question, Chuntian began organising activities along the Regent’s Canal. Initially, these activities were small-scale but gradually expanded in scope. Through a series of initiatives, ranging from a simple storytelling workshop featuring paper boats to multidisciplinary art festivals with a fleet, she has cultivated a growing network of creative and canal communities.
Heritage as a Space for Site-Specific Art & Place-based Design
In organising the CDAF, Chuntian emphasises the significance of site-specific art, encouraging artists to engage deeply with the unique space of the canals for their creative expressions. She also calls on the design community to pay attention to these hidden infrastructures and conduct place-based design activities along the waterways. To support this initiative, CD joined the London Design Festival (LDF) in 2023 as an official partner.
Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a Method for Community Engagement and Development
In the development of CD and CDAF, Chuntian effectively employs the key principles of PAR. PAR emphasises the importance of participants' experiences, cultural backgrounds, and unique perspectives in social and cultural projects, advocating for individual reflection and practice to drive collective action and social change. Chuntian demonstrates the application of this theory by integrating her own experiences into the project.
Firstly, Chuntian's cross-cultural background enriches the vision of CDAF. She connects the ancient Chinese tradition of water-based art activities with London’s contemporary canal culture, creating a time-spanning arts festival platform that reflects her personal cultural history. This approach is not merely a retrospective on history; it combines a profound understanding of both cultures with a response to societal needs, resulting in new forms of artistic expression.
Secondly, Chuntian's experience as a boater embodies the spirit of PAR. After two years of involvement in the CD project, she became a narrowboat dweller, a transition that not only altered her daily life but also deeply influenced her perception of nature and waterways. Living on a boat heightened her awareness of water flow, weather changes, seasonal cycles, and the fragile ecosystems along the canal. This unique experience inspired her to focus this year's festival theme on the waterways, with site-specific art and performances that not only showcase the beauty of the canal but also highlight its vulnerability in the context of climate change. Moreover, this experience connected her with a growing network of fellow boater artists, leading her to curate a special exhibition titled “Waterborne: Boater Art” within the festival.
Through self-reflection and practice, Chuntian explores how "art can serve as a tool for social change." She provides opportunities for collective community engagement through art, helping people find cultural and emotional belonging within the canal environment while also establishing a sense of home in a foreign land.
This interplay between self and society embodies the core principles of PAR: an individual's identity, experiences, and reflections are not merely additive values in cultural projects; they are essential drivers of change and sources of innovation. Through her experiences as a boater, her cultural background, and her artistic practice, Chuntian has shaped CDAF into a self-based cultural experiment that reflects her personal growth and deep understanding of the relationships among society, environment, and art.
Waterways as a Pathway for Future Growth, Water as a Medium for Cultural Exchange
Water is the core medium of the CDAF, connecting different cultures and disciplines while acting as a bridge for cross-cultural exchange. Artists create around the theme of water, exploring the relationships between people and nature, history and modernity, thereby fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. At the local festival, water not only symbolises diversity but also promotes connections between art, the environment, and communities.
On the international stage, in 2023, CDAF partnered with the Aranya Theatre Festival in China to launch a water-based artist exchange programme between UK and China. This initiative invited artists from both countries to engage in artistic creation and dialogue through waterways. British artists travelled to the seaside location of Aranya in China, immersing themselves in the local nature and culture; simultaneously, Chinese artists showcased their understanding and expression of water along the canals in London. This cross-cultural artistic exchange not only strengthened collaboration between Chinese and British artists but also transcended language barriers through the shared element of water, allowing their creations to resonate with new meanings and connections within different cultural contexts. In the autumn of 2023, during the LDF, CD hosted a diverse array of activities, including a cultural exchange exhibition Bodies of Water - Vienna Meets London. This event marked another waterway-based cultural exchange, connecting London’s Regent’s Canal with Vienna’s Danube Canal.
Looking ahead, CDAF plans to transform this festival into a linear water-based arts celebration throughout London, from Regent's Canal to the River Lea, with activity centres in places like King’s Cross, Paddington, and Hackney Wick. Through this expansion, CDAF will not only serve as a link connecting various cultural districts in London but also facilitate deep interactions between emerging artists and communities, achieving cross-regional cultural exchanges. The waterways will embody CDAF's vision, gradually weaving a network of innovation along the linear canals. This expansion will attract more young audiences, emerging artists, and participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, reinvigorating London's canals and driving ongoing artistic activities and projects. Additionally, CDAF's expansion plan will deepen its role as a tool for promoting social change, environmental awareness, and cultural revival, propelling future development along the waterways.
Chuntian's CDAF plays a transformative role in London's culture by seamlessly integrating art, community, and environmental awareness. By utilising the historic waterways, Chuntian redefines artistic engagement and demonstrates how art can serve as a catalyst for social innovation and environmental consciousness. Her background in service design and experience as a narrowboat dweller provide unique perspectives that foster connections between diverse communities.
Chuntian's commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her collaborations with various stakeholders and support for emerging artists. Through projects that incorporate principles of participatory action research, she encourages community involvement and emphasises art as a tool for change. CDAF not only revives the industrial heritage of London's canals but also inspires a new generation of artists and audiences to engage with their environment.
Looking ahead, Chuntian envisions the festival as a water-based celebration of the arts that promotes cross-cultural exchange and deepens community connections. Her vision reshapes the narrative of London's waterways, enhancing their significance as vibrant cultural conduits for the future.
Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream reimagines the interconnections between art, nature, community, and heritage. Through the Canal Dream Art Festival (CDAF) that she founded, Chuntian demonstrates how to leverage London's unique waterways to integrate contemporary art into historical sites, fostering social innovation and community engagement. The festival acts as a platform to inspire dialogues between public art and social change, showcasing her distinctive contributions to London's cultural landscape.
A New Model for Water-based Art
This August, the Regent’s Canal in King’s Cross came alive with the CDAF. The week-long event featured a diverse array of exhibitions, film screenings, poetry readings, dance, and music performances, all staged across five boats and a canal-side art space. CD is not just an art festival, it is a dynamic, evolving social innovation project that challenges traditional notions of artistic experience while expanding the possibilities of social innovation. As the founder and director of Canal Dream CIC, Chuntian Hu plays a pivotal role in transforming London's overlooked waterways into vibrant cultural corridors. Originally from China, Chuntian moved to the UK to study Service Design at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2021. After discovering London's unique canal network, she initiated CD as her graduation project and subsequently founded the Canal Dream Community Interest Company. She now resides on a narrowboat along London’s canals and rivers.
Organising a waterborne art festival is fraught with challenges; navigating the boats, coordinating docking, and managing the differing spaces and facilities require meticulous planning. The limited activity space on the canals, along with the instability of the boats and weather fluctuations, presents additional risks. However, the unique and profound rewards of a waterborne art festival are undeniable. The historical context of the canals and boats imbues the artistic activities with a distinctive poetry, allowing audiences to experience art in entirely new settings.
Chuntian's leadership is evident not only in her ability to gather artists and creatives from various disciplines but also in her capacity to bring together stakeholders from sectors such as culture, arts, environment, and education for dialogue and collaboration. She collaborates with organisations like Word on the Water - The London Bookbarge to extend the festival's programming into literature and poetry, and she partners with Global Generation to demonstrate her commitment to sustainability and educational outreach.
CD is a breath of fresh air in both the arts and social innovation sectors. It applies systematic and strategic thinking from service design to exhibition and event planning, illustrating the potential for art to effect social change.
Art as a Tool for Social and Environmental Change
One of the core elements of Chuntian’s work is her belief in art as a medium for social change and environmental awareness. Chuntian arrived in the UK at the end of the pandemic, and the concept of CD emerged in response to the urgent need for reconnection in society post-pandemic. The pandemic had a severe impact on the creative industries, particularly music and performing arts, leaving many feeling isolated and helpless. In this context, CD was born, aiming to reshape social connections through art.
The direction of CD's projects is inspired by three key concepts: art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art. Art prescriptions link individuals with local arts and cultural activities, promoting well-being through creative participation; green prescriptions connect people with nature-based activities; and site-specific art emphasises creating and showcasing artistic works in specific locations, allowing participants to deepen their experiences through the physical and historical context of the place.
Chuntian defined the positioning of CD and drove her practice over the next three years with a pivotal question: “How might we create a range of art-in-nature services on the canal that integrate art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art to foster opportunities for creative practices, community well-being, climate action, and canal regeneration?” Starting from this question, Chuntian began organising activities along the Regent’s Canal. Initially, these activities were small-scale but gradually expanded in scope. Through a series of initiatives, ranging from a simple storytelling workshop featuring paper boats to multidisciplinary art festivals with a fleet, she has cultivated a growing network of creative and canal communities.
Heritage as a Space for Site-Specific Art & Place-based Design
In organising the CDAF, Chuntian emphasises the significance of site-specific art, encouraging artists to engage deeply with the unique space of the canals for their creative expressions. She also calls on the design community to pay attention to these hidden infrastructures and conduct place-based design activities along the waterways. To support this initiative, CD joined the London Design Festival (LDF) in 2023 as an official partner.
Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a Method for Community Engagement and Development
In the development of CD and CDAF, Chuntian effectively employs the key principles of PAR. PAR emphasises the importance of participants' experiences, cultural backgrounds, and unique perspectives in social and cultural projects, advocating for individual reflection and practice to drive collective action and social change. Chuntian demonstrates the application of this theory by integrating her own experiences into the project.
Firstly, Chuntian's cross-cultural background enriches the vision of CDAF. She connects the ancient Chinese tradition of water-based art activities with London’s contemporary canal culture, creating a time-spanning arts festival platform that reflects her personal cultural history. This approach is not merely a retrospective on history; it combines a profound understanding of both cultures with a response to societal needs, resulting in new forms of artistic expression.
Secondly, Chuntian's experience as a boater embodies the spirit of PAR. After two years of involvement in the CD project, she became a narrowboat dweller, a transition that not only altered her daily life but also deeply influenced her perception of nature and waterways. Living on a boat heightened her awareness of water flow, weather changes, seasonal cycles, and the fragile ecosystems along the canal. This unique experience inspired her to focus this year's festival theme on the waterways, with site-specific art and performances that not only showcase the beauty of the canal but also highlight its vulnerability in the context of climate change. Moreover, this experience connected her with a growing network of fellow boater artists, leading her to curate a special exhibition titled “Waterborne: Boater Art” within the festival.
Through self-reflection and practice, Chuntian explores how "art can serve as a tool for social change." She provides opportunities for collective community engagement through art, helping people find cultural and emotional belonging within the canal environment while also establishing a sense of home in a foreign land.
This interplay between self and society embodies the core principles of PAR: an individual's identity, experiences, and reflections are not merely additive values in cultural projects; they are essential drivers of change and sources of innovation. Through her experiences as a boater, her cultural background, and her artistic practice, Chuntian has shaped CDAF into a self-based cultural experiment that reflects her personal growth and deep understanding of the relationships among society, environment, and art.
Waterways as a Pathway for Future Growth, Water as a Medium for Cultural Exchange
Water is the core medium of the CDAF, connecting different cultures and disciplines while acting as a bridge for cross-cultural exchange. Artists create around the theme of water, exploring the relationships between people and nature, history and modernity, thereby fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. At the local festival, water not only symbolises diversity but also promotes connections between art, the environment, and communities.
On the international stage, in 2023, CDAF partnered with the Aranya Theatre Festival in China to launch a water-based artist exchange programme between UK and China. This initiative invited artists from both countries to engage in artistic creation and dialogue through waterways. British artists travelled to the seaside location of Aranya in China, immersing themselves in the local nature and culture; simultaneously, Chinese artists showcased their understanding and expression of water along the canals in London. This cross-cultural artistic exchange not only strengthened collaboration between Chinese and British artists but also transcended language barriers through the shared element of water, allowing their creations to resonate with new meanings and connections within different cultural contexts. In the autumn of 2023, during the LDF, CD hosted a diverse array of activities, including a cultural exchange exhibition Bodies of Water - Vienna Meets London. This event marked another waterway-based cultural exchange, connecting London’s Regent’s Canal with Vienna’s Danube Canal.
Looking ahead, CDAF plans to transform this festival into a linear water-based arts celebration throughout London, from Regent's Canal to the River Lea, with activity centres in places like King’s Cross, Paddington, and Hackney Wick. Through this expansion, CDAF will not only serve as a link connecting various cultural districts in London but also facilitate deep interactions between emerging artists and communities, achieving cross-regional cultural exchanges. The waterways will embody CDAF's vision, gradually weaving a network of innovation along the linear canals. This expansion will attract more young audiences, emerging artists, and participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, reinvigorating London's canals and driving ongoing artistic activities and projects. Additionally, CDAF's expansion plan will deepen its role as a tool for promoting social change, environmental awareness, and cultural revival, propelling future development along the waterways.
Chuntian's CDAF plays a transformative role in London's culture by seamlessly integrating art, community, and environmental awareness. By utilising the historic waterways, Chuntian redefines artistic engagement and demonstrates how art can serve as a catalyst for social innovation and environmental consciousness. Her background in service design and experience as a narrowboat dweller provide unique perspectives that foster connections between diverse communities.
Chuntian's commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her collaborations with various stakeholders and support for emerging artists. Through projects that incorporate principles of participatory action research, she encourages community involvement and emphasises art as a tool for change. CDAF not only revives the industrial heritage of London's canals but also inspires a new generation of artists and audiences to engage with their environment.
Looking ahead, Chuntian envisions the festival as a water-based celebration of the arts that promotes cross-cultural exchange and deepens community connections. Her vision reshapes the narrative of London's waterways, enhancing their significance as vibrant cultural conduits for the future.
Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream reimagines the interconnections between art, nature, community, and heritage. Through the Canal Dream Art Festival (CDAF) that she founded, Chuntian demonstrates how to leverage London's unique waterways to integrate contemporary art into historical sites, fostering social innovation and community engagement. The festival acts as a platform to inspire dialogues between public art and social change, showcasing her distinctive contributions to London's cultural landscape.
A New Model for Water-based Art
This August, the Regent’s Canal in King’s Cross came alive with the CDAF. The week-long event featured a diverse array of exhibitions, film screenings, poetry readings, dance, and music performances, all staged across five boats and a canal-side art space. CD is not just an art festival, it is a dynamic, evolving social innovation project that challenges traditional notions of artistic experience while expanding the possibilities of social innovation. As the founder and director of Canal Dream CIC, Chuntian Hu plays a pivotal role in transforming London's overlooked waterways into vibrant cultural corridors. Originally from China, Chuntian moved to the UK to study Service Design at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2021. After discovering London's unique canal network, she initiated CD as her graduation project and subsequently founded the Canal Dream Community Interest Company. She now resides on a narrowboat along London’s canals and rivers.
Organising a waterborne art festival is fraught with challenges; navigating the boats, coordinating docking, and managing the differing spaces and facilities require meticulous planning. The limited activity space on the canals, along with the instability of the boats and weather fluctuations, presents additional risks. However, the unique and profound rewards of a waterborne art festival are undeniable. The historical context of the canals and boats imbues the artistic activities with a distinctive poetry, allowing audiences to experience art in entirely new settings.
Chuntian's leadership is evident not only in her ability to gather artists and creatives from various disciplines but also in her capacity to bring together stakeholders from sectors such as culture, arts, environment, and education for dialogue and collaboration. She collaborates with organisations like Word on the Water - The London Bookbarge to extend the festival's programming into literature and poetry, and she partners with Global Generation to demonstrate her commitment to sustainability and educational outreach.
CD is a breath of fresh air in both the arts and social innovation sectors. It applies systematic and strategic thinking from service design to exhibition and event planning, illustrating the potential for art to effect social change.
Art as a Tool for Social and Environmental Change
One of the core elements of Chuntian’s work is her belief in art as a medium for social change and environmental awareness. Chuntian arrived in the UK at the end of the pandemic, and the concept of CD emerged in response to the urgent need for reconnection in society post-pandemic. The pandemic had a severe impact on the creative industries, particularly music and performing arts, leaving many feeling isolated and helpless. In this context, CD was born, aiming to reshape social connections through art.
The direction of CD's projects is inspired by three key concepts: art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art. Art prescriptions link individuals with local arts and cultural activities, promoting well-being through creative participation; green prescriptions connect people with nature-based activities; and site-specific art emphasises creating and showcasing artistic works in specific locations, allowing participants to deepen their experiences through the physical and historical context of the place.
Chuntian defined the positioning of CD and drove her practice over the next three years with a pivotal question: “How might we create a range of art-in-nature services on the canal that integrate art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art to foster opportunities for creative practices, community well-being, climate action, and canal regeneration?” Starting from this question, Chuntian began organising activities along the Regent’s Canal. Initially, these activities were small-scale but gradually expanded in scope. Through a series of initiatives, ranging from a simple storytelling workshop featuring paper boats to multidisciplinary art festivals with a fleet, she has cultivated a growing network of creative and canal communities.
Heritage as a Space for Site-Specific Art & Place-based Design
In organising the CDAF, Chuntian emphasises the significance of site-specific art, encouraging artists to engage deeply with the unique space of the canals for their creative expressions. She also calls on the design community to pay attention to these hidden infrastructures and conduct place-based design activities along the waterways. To support this initiative, CD joined the London Design Festival (LDF) in 2023 as an official partner.
Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a Method for Community Engagement and Development
In the development of CD and CDAF, Chuntian effectively employs the key principles of PAR. PAR emphasises the importance of participants' experiences, cultural backgrounds, and unique perspectives in social and cultural projects, advocating for individual reflection and practice to drive collective action and social change. Chuntian demonstrates the application of this theory by integrating her own experiences into the project.
Firstly, Chuntian's cross-cultural background enriches the vision of CDAF. She connects the ancient Chinese tradition of water-based art activities with London’s contemporary canal culture, creating a time-spanning arts festival platform that reflects her personal cultural history. This approach is not merely a retrospective on history; it combines a profound understanding of both cultures with a response to societal needs, resulting in new forms of artistic expression.
Secondly, Chuntian's experience as a boater embodies the spirit of PAR. After two years of involvement in the CD project, she became a narrowboat dweller, a transition that not only altered her daily life but also deeply influenced her perception of nature and waterways. Living on a boat heightened her awareness of water flow, weather changes, seasonal cycles, and the fragile ecosystems along the canal. This unique experience inspired her to focus this year's festival theme on the waterways, with site-specific art and performances that not only showcase the beauty of the canal but also highlight its vulnerability in the context of climate change. Moreover, this experience connected her with a growing network of fellow boater artists, leading her to curate a special exhibition titled “Waterborne: Boater Art” within the festival.
Through self-reflection and practice, Chuntian explores how "art can serve as a tool for social change." She provides opportunities for collective community engagement through art, helping people find cultural and emotional belonging within the canal environment while also establishing a sense of home in a foreign land.
This interplay between self and society embodies the core principles of PAR: an individual's identity, experiences, and reflections are not merely additive values in cultural projects; they are essential drivers of change and sources of innovation. Through her experiences as a boater, her cultural background, and her artistic practice, Chuntian has shaped CDAF into a self-based cultural experiment that reflects her personal growth and deep understanding of the relationships among society, environment, and art.
Waterways as a Pathway for Future Growth, Water as a Medium for Cultural Exchange
Water is the core medium of the CDAF, connecting different cultures and disciplines while acting as a bridge for cross-cultural exchange. Artists create around the theme of water, exploring the relationships between people and nature, history and modernity, thereby fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. At the local festival, water not only symbolises diversity but also promotes connections between art, the environment, and communities.
On the international stage, in 2023, CDAF partnered with the Aranya Theatre Festival in China to launch a water-based artist exchange programme between UK and China. This initiative invited artists from both countries to engage in artistic creation and dialogue through waterways. British artists travelled to the seaside location of Aranya in China, immersing themselves in the local nature and culture; simultaneously, Chinese artists showcased their understanding and expression of water along the canals in London. This cross-cultural artistic exchange not only strengthened collaboration between Chinese and British artists but also transcended language barriers through the shared element of water, allowing their creations to resonate with new meanings and connections within different cultural contexts. In the autumn of 2023, during the LDF, CD hosted a diverse array of activities, including a cultural exchange exhibition Bodies of Water - Vienna Meets London. This event marked another waterway-based cultural exchange, connecting London’s Regent’s Canal with Vienna’s Danube Canal.
Looking ahead, CDAF plans to transform this festival into a linear water-based arts celebration throughout London, from Regent's Canal to the River Lea, with activity centres in places like King’s Cross, Paddington, and Hackney Wick. Through this expansion, CDAF will not only serve as a link connecting various cultural districts in London but also facilitate deep interactions between emerging artists and communities, achieving cross-regional cultural exchanges. The waterways will embody CDAF's vision, gradually weaving a network of innovation along the linear canals. This expansion will attract more young audiences, emerging artists, and participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, reinvigorating London's canals and driving ongoing artistic activities and projects. Additionally, CDAF's expansion plan will deepen its role as a tool for promoting social change, environmental awareness, and cultural revival, propelling future development along the waterways.
Chuntian's CDAF plays a transformative role in London's culture by seamlessly integrating art, community, and environmental awareness. By utilising the historic waterways, Chuntian redefines artistic engagement and demonstrates how art can serve as a catalyst for social innovation and environmental consciousness. Her background in service design and experience as a narrowboat dweller provide unique perspectives that foster connections between diverse communities.
Chuntian's commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her collaborations with various stakeholders and support for emerging artists. Through projects that incorporate principles of participatory action research, she encourages community involvement and emphasises art as a tool for change. CDAF not only revives the industrial heritage of London's canals but also inspires a new generation of artists and audiences to engage with their environment.
Looking ahead, Chuntian envisions the festival as a water-based celebration of the arts that promotes cross-cultural exchange and deepens community connections. Her vision reshapes the narrative of London's waterways, enhancing their significance as vibrant cultural conduits for the future.
Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream reimagines the interconnections between art, nature, community, and heritage. Through the Canal Dream Art Festival (CDAF) that she founded, Chuntian demonstrates how to leverage London's unique waterways to integrate contemporary art into historical sites, fostering social innovation and community engagement. The festival acts as a platform to inspire dialogues between public art and social change, showcasing her distinctive contributions to London's cultural landscape.
A New Model for Water-based Art
This August, the Regent’s Canal in King’s Cross came alive with the CDAF. The week-long event featured a diverse array of exhibitions, film screenings, poetry readings, dance, and music performances, all staged across five boats and a canal-side art space. CD is not just an art festival, it is a dynamic, evolving social innovation project that challenges traditional notions of artistic experience while expanding the possibilities of social innovation. As the founder and director of Canal Dream CIC, Chuntian Hu plays a pivotal role in transforming London's overlooked waterways into vibrant cultural corridors. Originally from China, Chuntian moved to the UK to study Service Design at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2021. After discovering London's unique canal network, she initiated CD as her graduation project and subsequently founded the Canal Dream Community Interest Company. She now resides on a narrowboat along London’s canals and rivers.
Organising a waterborne art festival is fraught with challenges; navigating the boats, coordinating docking, and managing the differing spaces and facilities require meticulous planning. The limited activity space on the canals, along with the instability of the boats and weather fluctuations, presents additional risks. However, the unique and profound rewards of a waterborne art festival are undeniable. The historical context of the canals and boats imbues the artistic activities with a distinctive poetry, allowing audiences to experience art in entirely new settings.
Chuntian's leadership is evident not only in her ability to gather artists and creatives from various disciplines but also in her capacity to bring together stakeholders from sectors such as culture, arts, environment, and education for dialogue and collaboration. She collaborates with organisations like Word on the Water - The London Bookbarge to extend the festival's programming into literature and poetry, and she partners with Global Generation to demonstrate her commitment to sustainability and educational outreach.
CD is a breath of fresh air in both the arts and social innovation sectors. It applies systematic and strategic thinking from service design to exhibition and event planning, illustrating the potential for art to effect social change.
Art as a Tool for Social and Environmental Change
One of the core elements of Chuntian’s work is her belief in art as a medium for social change and environmental awareness. Chuntian arrived in the UK at the end of the pandemic, and the concept of CD emerged in response to the urgent need for reconnection in society post-pandemic. The pandemic had a severe impact on the creative industries, particularly music and performing arts, leaving many feeling isolated and helpless. In this context, CD was born, aiming to reshape social connections through art.
The direction of CD's projects is inspired by three key concepts: art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art. Art prescriptions link individuals with local arts and cultural activities, promoting well-being through creative participation; green prescriptions connect people with nature-based activities; and site-specific art emphasises creating and showcasing artistic works in specific locations, allowing participants to deepen their experiences through the physical and historical context of the place.
Chuntian defined the positioning of CD and drove her practice over the next three years with a pivotal question: “How might we create a range of art-in-nature services on the canal that integrate art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art to foster opportunities for creative practices, community well-being, climate action, and canal regeneration?” Starting from this question, Chuntian began organising activities along the Regent’s Canal. Initially, these activities were small-scale but gradually expanded in scope. Through a series of initiatives, ranging from a simple storytelling workshop featuring paper boats to multidisciplinary art festivals with a fleet, she has cultivated a growing network of creative and canal communities.
Heritage as a Space for Site-Specific Art & Place-based Design
In organising the CDAF, Chuntian emphasises the significance of site-specific art, encouraging artists to engage deeply with the unique space of the canals for their creative expressions. She also calls on the design community to pay attention to these hidden infrastructures and conduct place-based design activities along the waterways. To support this initiative, CD joined the London Design Festival (LDF) in 2023 as an official partner.
Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a Method for Community Engagement and Development
In the development of CD and CDAF, Chuntian effectively employs the key principles of PAR. PAR emphasises the importance of participants' experiences, cultural backgrounds, and unique perspectives in social and cultural projects, advocating for individual reflection and practice to drive collective action and social change. Chuntian demonstrates the application of this theory by integrating her own experiences into the project.
Firstly, Chuntian's cross-cultural background enriches the vision of CDAF. She connects the ancient Chinese tradition of water-based art activities with London’s contemporary canal culture, creating a time-spanning arts festival platform that reflects her personal cultural history. This approach is not merely a retrospective on history; it combines a profound understanding of both cultures with a response to societal needs, resulting in new forms of artistic expression.
Secondly, Chuntian's experience as a boater embodies the spirit of PAR. After two years of involvement in the CD project, she became a narrowboat dweller, a transition that not only altered her daily life but also deeply influenced her perception of nature and waterways. Living on a boat heightened her awareness of water flow, weather changes, seasonal cycles, and the fragile ecosystems along the canal. This unique experience inspired her to focus this year's festival theme on the waterways, with site-specific art and performances that not only showcase the beauty of the canal but also highlight its vulnerability in the context of climate change. Moreover, this experience connected her with a growing network of fellow boater artists, leading her to curate a special exhibition titled “Waterborne: Boater Art” within the festival.
Through self-reflection and practice, Chuntian explores how "art can serve as a tool for social change." She provides opportunities for collective community engagement through art, helping people find cultural and emotional belonging within the canal environment while also establishing a sense of home in a foreign land.
This interplay between self and society embodies the core principles of PAR: an individual's identity, experiences, and reflections are not merely additive values in cultural projects; they are essential drivers of change and sources of innovation. Through her experiences as a boater, her cultural background, and her artistic practice, Chuntian has shaped CDAF into a self-based cultural experiment that reflects her personal growth and deep understanding of the relationships among society, environment, and art.
Waterways as a Pathway for Future Growth, Water as a Medium for Cultural Exchange
Water is the core medium of the CDAF, connecting different cultures and disciplines while acting as a bridge for cross-cultural exchange. Artists create around the theme of water, exploring the relationships between people and nature, history and modernity, thereby fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. At the local festival, water not only symbolises diversity but also promotes connections between art, the environment, and communities.
On the international stage, in 2023, CDAF partnered with the Aranya Theatre Festival in China to launch a water-based artist exchange programme between UK and China. This initiative invited artists from both countries to engage in artistic creation and dialogue through waterways. British artists travelled to the seaside location of Aranya in China, immersing themselves in the local nature and culture; simultaneously, Chinese artists showcased their understanding and expression of water along the canals in London. This cross-cultural artistic exchange not only strengthened collaboration between Chinese and British artists but also transcended language barriers through the shared element of water, allowing their creations to resonate with new meanings and connections within different cultural contexts. In the autumn of 2023, during the LDF, CD hosted a diverse array of activities, including a cultural exchange exhibition Bodies of Water - Vienna Meets London. This event marked another waterway-based cultural exchange, connecting London’s Regent’s Canal with Vienna’s Danube Canal.
Looking ahead, CDAF plans to transform this festival into a linear water-based arts celebration throughout London, from Regent's Canal to the River Lea, with activity centres in places like King’s Cross, Paddington, and Hackney Wick. Through this expansion, CDAF will not only serve as a link connecting various cultural districts in London but also facilitate deep interactions between emerging artists and communities, achieving cross-regional cultural exchanges. The waterways will embody CDAF's vision, gradually weaving a network of innovation along the linear canals. This expansion will attract more young audiences, emerging artists, and participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, reinvigorating London's canals and driving ongoing artistic activities and projects. Additionally, CDAF's expansion plan will deepen its role as a tool for promoting social change, environmental awareness, and cultural revival, propelling future development along the waterways.
Chuntian's CDAF plays a transformative role in London's culture by seamlessly integrating art, community, and environmental awareness. By utilising the historic waterways, Chuntian redefines artistic engagement and demonstrates how art can serve as a catalyst for social innovation and environmental consciousness. Her background in service design and experience as a narrowboat dweller provide unique perspectives that foster connections between diverse communities.
Chuntian's commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her collaborations with various stakeholders and support for emerging artists. Through projects that incorporate principles of participatory action research, she encourages community involvement and emphasises art as a tool for change. CDAF not only revives the industrial heritage of London's canals but also inspires a new generation of artists and audiences to engage with their environment.
Looking ahead, Chuntian envisions the festival as a water-based celebration of the arts that promotes cross-cultural exchange and deepens community connections. Her vision reshapes the narrative of London's waterways, enhancing their significance as vibrant cultural conduits for the future.
Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream reimagines the interconnections between art, nature, community, and heritage. Through the Canal Dream Art Festival (CDAF) that she founded, Chuntian demonstrates how to leverage London's unique waterways to integrate contemporary art into historical sites, fostering social innovation and community engagement. The festival acts as a platform to inspire dialogues between public art and social change, showcasing her distinctive contributions to London's cultural landscape.
A New Model for Water-based Art
This August, the Regent’s Canal in King’s Cross came alive with the CDAF. The week-long event featured a diverse array of exhibitions, film screenings, poetry readings, dance, and music performances, all staged across five boats and a canal-side art space. CD is not just an art festival, it is a dynamic, evolving social innovation project that challenges traditional notions of artistic experience while expanding the possibilities of social innovation. As the founder and director of Canal Dream CIC, Chuntian Hu plays a pivotal role in transforming London's overlooked waterways into vibrant cultural corridors. Originally from China, Chuntian moved to the UK to study Service Design at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2021. After discovering London's unique canal network, she initiated CD as her graduation project and subsequently founded the Canal Dream Community Interest Company. She now resides on a narrowboat along London’s canals and rivers.
Organising a waterborne art festival is fraught with challenges; navigating the boats, coordinating docking, and managing the differing spaces and facilities require meticulous planning. The limited activity space on the canals, along with the instability of the boats and weather fluctuations, presents additional risks. However, the unique and profound rewards of a waterborne art festival are undeniable. The historical context of the canals and boats imbues the artistic activities with a distinctive poetry, allowing audiences to experience art in entirely new settings.
Chuntian's leadership is evident not only in her ability to gather artists and creatives from various disciplines but also in her capacity to bring together stakeholders from sectors such as culture, arts, environment, and education for dialogue and collaboration. She collaborates with organisations like Word on the Water - The London Bookbarge to extend the festival's programming into literature and poetry, and she partners with Global Generation to demonstrate her commitment to sustainability and educational outreach.
CD is a breath of fresh air in both the arts and social innovation sectors. It applies systematic and strategic thinking from service design to exhibition and event planning, illustrating the potential for art to effect social change.
Art as a Tool for Social and Environmental Change
One of the core elements of Chuntian’s work is her belief in art as a medium for social change and environmental awareness. Chuntian arrived in the UK at the end of the pandemic, and the concept of CD emerged in response to the urgent need for reconnection in society post-pandemic. The pandemic had a severe impact on the creative industries, particularly music and performing arts, leaving many feeling isolated and helpless. In this context, CD was born, aiming to reshape social connections through art.
The direction of CD's projects is inspired by three key concepts: art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art. Art prescriptions link individuals with local arts and cultural activities, promoting well-being through creative participation; green prescriptions connect people with nature-based activities; and site-specific art emphasises creating and showcasing artistic works in specific locations, allowing participants to deepen their experiences through the physical and historical context of the place.
Chuntian defined the positioning of CD and drove her practice over the next three years with a pivotal question: “How might we create a range of art-in-nature services on the canal that integrate art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art to foster opportunities for creative practices, community well-being, climate action, and canal regeneration?” Starting from this question, Chuntian began organising activities along the Regent’s Canal. Initially, these activities were small-scale but gradually expanded in scope. Through a series of initiatives, ranging from a simple storytelling workshop featuring paper boats to multidisciplinary art festivals with a fleet, she has cultivated a growing network of creative and canal communities.
Heritage as a Space for Site-Specific Art & Place-based Design
In organising the CDAF, Chuntian emphasises the significance of site-specific art, encouraging artists to engage deeply with the unique space of the canals for their creative expressions. She also calls on the design community to pay attention to these hidden infrastructures and conduct place-based design activities along the waterways. To support this initiative, CD joined the London Design Festival (LDF) in 2023 as an official partner.
Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a Method for Community Engagement and Development
In the development of CD and CDAF, Chuntian effectively employs the key principles of PAR. PAR emphasises the importance of participants' experiences, cultural backgrounds, and unique perspectives in social and cultural projects, advocating for individual reflection and practice to drive collective action and social change. Chuntian demonstrates the application of this theory by integrating her own experiences into the project.
Firstly, Chuntian's cross-cultural background enriches the vision of CDAF. She connects the ancient Chinese tradition of water-based art activities with London’s contemporary canal culture, creating a time-spanning arts festival platform that reflects her personal cultural history. This approach is not merely a retrospective on history; it combines a profound understanding of both cultures with a response to societal needs, resulting in new forms of artistic expression.
Secondly, Chuntian's experience as a boater embodies the spirit of PAR. After two years of involvement in the CD project, she became a narrowboat dweller, a transition that not only altered her daily life but also deeply influenced her perception of nature and waterways. Living on a boat heightened her awareness of water flow, weather changes, seasonal cycles, and the fragile ecosystems along the canal. This unique experience inspired her to focus this year's festival theme on the waterways, with site-specific art and performances that not only showcase the beauty of the canal but also highlight its vulnerability in the context of climate change. Moreover, this experience connected her with a growing network of fellow boater artists, leading her to curate a special exhibition titled “Waterborne: Boater Art” within the festival.
Through self-reflection and practice, Chuntian explores how "art can serve as a tool for social change." She provides opportunities for collective community engagement through art, helping people find cultural and emotional belonging within the canal environment while also establishing a sense of home in a foreign land.
This interplay between self and society embodies the core principles of PAR: an individual's identity, experiences, and reflections are not merely additive values in cultural projects; they are essential drivers of change and sources of innovation. Through her experiences as a boater, her cultural background, and her artistic practice, Chuntian has shaped CDAF into a self-based cultural experiment that reflects her personal growth and deep understanding of the relationships among society, environment, and art.
Waterways as a Pathway for Future Growth, Water as a Medium for Cultural Exchange
Water is the core medium of the CDAF, connecting different cultures and disciplines while acting as a bridge for cross-cultural exchange. Artists create around the theme of water, exploring the relationships between people and nature, history and modernity, thereby fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. At the local festival, water not only symbolises diversity but also promotes connections between art, the environment, and communities.
On the international stage, in 2023, CDAF partnered with the Aranya Theatre Festival in China to launch a water-based artist exchange programme between UK and China. This initiative invited artists from both countries to engage in artistic creation and dialogue through waterways. British artists travelled to the seaside location of Aranya in China, immersing themselves in the local nature and culture; simultaneously, Chinese artists showcased their understanding and expression of water along the canals in London. This cross-cultural artistic exchange not only strengthened collaboration between Chinese and British artists but also transcended language barriers through the shared element of water, allowing their creations to resonate with new meanings and connections within different cultural contexts. In the autumn of 2023, during the LDF, CD hosted a diverse array of activities, including a cultural exchange exhibition Bodies of Water - Vienna Meets London. This event marked another waterway-based cultural exchange, connecting London’s Regent’s Canal with Vienna’s Danube Canal.
Looking ahead, CDAF plans to transform this festival into a linear water-based arts celebration throughout London, from Regent's Canal to the River Lea, with activity centres in places like King’s Cross, Paddington, and Hackney Wick. Through this expansion, CDAF will not only serve as a link connecting various cultural districts in London but also facilitate deep interactions between emerging artists and communities, achieving cross-regional cultural exchanges. The waterways will embody CDAF's vision, gradually weaving a network of innovation along the linear canals. This expansion will attract more young audiences, emerging artists, and participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, reinvigorating London's canals and driving ongoing artistic activities and projects. Additionally, CDAF's expansion plan will deepen its role as a tool for promoting social change, environmental awareness, and cultural revival, propelling future development along the waterways.
Chuntian's CDAF plays a transformative role in London's culture by seamlessly integrating art, community, and environmental awareness. By utilising the historic waterways, Chuntian redefines artistic engagement and demonstrates how art can serve as a catalyst for social innovation and environmental consciousness. Her background in service design and experience as a narrowboat dweller provide unique perspectives that foster connections between diverse communities.
Chuntian's commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her collaborations with various stakeholders and support for emerging artists. Through projects that incorporate principles of participatory action research, she encourages community involvement and emphasises art as a tool for change. CDAF not only revives the industrial heritage of London's canals but also inspires a new generation of artists and audiences to engage with their environment.
Looking ahead, Chuntian envisions the festival as a water-based celebration of the arts that promotes cross-cultural exchange and deepens community connections. Her vision reshapes the narrative of London's waterways, enhancing their significance as vibrant cultural conduits for the future.
Chuntian Hu's Canal Dream reimagines the interconnections between art, nature, community, and heritage. Through the Canal Dream Art Festival (CDAF) that she founded, Chuntian demonstrates how to leverage London's unique waterways to integrate contemporary art into historical sites, fostering social innovation and community engagement. The festival acts as a platform to inspire dialogues between public art and social change, showcasing her distinctive contributions to London's cultural landscape.
A New Model for Water-based Art
This August, the Regent’s Canal in King’s Cross came alive with the CDAF. The week-long event featured a diverse array of exhibitions, film screenings, poetry readings, dance, and music performances, all staged across five boats and a canal-side art space. CD is not just an art festival, it is a dynamic, evolving social innovation project that challenges traditional notions of artistic experience while expanding the possibilities of social innovation. As the founder and director of Canal Dream CIC, Chuntian Hu plays a pivotal role in transforming London's overlooked waterways into vibrant cultural corridors. Originally from China, Chuntian moved to the UK to study Service Design at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2021. After discovering London's unique canal network, she initiated CD as her graduation project and subsequently founded the Canal Dream Community Interest Company. She now resides on a narrowboat along London’s canals and rivers.
Organising a waterborne art festival is fraught with challenges; navigating the boats, coordinating docking, and managing the differing spaces and facilities require meticulous planning. The limited activity space on the canals, along with the instability of the boats and weather fluctuations, presents additional risks. However, the unique and profound rewards of a waterborne art festival are undeniable. The historical context of the canals and boats imbues the artistic activities with a distinctive poetry, allowing audiences to experience art in entirely new settings.
Chuntian's leadership is evident not only in her ability to gather artists and creatives from various disciplines but also in her capacity to bring together stakeholders from sectors such as culture, arts, environment, and education for dialogue and collaboration. She collaborates with organisations like Word on the Water - The London Bookbarge to extend the festival's programming into literature and poetry, and she partners with Global Generation to demonstrate her commitment to sustainability and educational outreach.
CD is a breath of fresh air in both the arts and social innovation sectors. It applies systematic and strategic thinking from service design to exhibition and event planning, illustrating the potential for art to effect social change.
Art as a Tool for Social and Environmental Change
One of the core elements of Chuntian’s work is her belief in art as a medium for social change and environmental awareness. Chuntian arrived in the UK at the end of the pandemic, and the concept of CD emerged in response to the urgent need for reconnection in society post-pandemic. The pandemic had a severe impact on the creative industries, particularly music and performing arts, leaving many feeling isolated and helpless. In this context, CD was born, aiming to reshape social connections through art.
The direction of CD's projects is inspired by three key concepts: art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art. Art prescriptions link individuals with local arts and cultural activities, promoting well-being through creative participation; green prescriptions connect people with nature-based activities; and site-specific art emphasises creating and showcasing artistic works in specific locations, allowing participants to deepen their experiences through the physical and historical context of the place.
Chuntian defined the positioning of CD and drove her practice over the next three years with a pivotal question: “How might we create a range of art-in-nature services on the canal that integrate art prescriptions, green prescriptions, and site-specific art to foster opportunities for creative practices, community well-being, climate action, and canal regeneration?” Starting from this question, Chuntian began organising activities along the Regent’s Canal. Initially, these activities were small-scale but gradually expanded in scope. Through a series of initiatives, ranging from a simple storytelling workshop featuring paper boats to multidisciplinary art festivals with a fleet, she has cultivated a growing network of creative and canal communities.
Heritage as a Space for Site-Specific Art & Place-based Design
In organising the CDAF, Chuntian emphasises the significance of site-specific art, encouraging artists to engage deeply with the unique space of the canals for their creative expressions. She also calls on the design community to pay attention to these hidden infrastructures and conduct place-based design activities along the waterways. To support this initiative, CD joined the London Design Festival (LDF) in 2023 as an official partner.
Participatory Action Research (PAR) as a Method for Community Engagement and Development
In the development of CD and CDAF, Chuntian effectively employs the key principles of PAR. PAR emphasises the importance of participants' experiences, cultural backgrounds, and unique perspectives in social and cultural projects, advocating for individual reflection and practice to drive collective action and social change. Chuntian demonstrates the application of this theory by integrating her own experiences into the project.
Firstly, Chuntian's cross-cultural background enriches the vision of CDAF. She connects the ancient Chinese tradition of water-based art activities with London’s contemporary canal culture, creating a time-spanning arts festival platform that reflects her personal cultural history. This approach is not merely a retrospective on history; it combines a profound understanding of both cultures with a response to societal needs, resulting in new forms of artistic expression.
Secondly, Chuntian's experience as a boater embodies the spirit of PAR. After two years of involvement in the CD project, she became a narrowboat dweller, a transition that not only altered her daily life but also deeply influenced her perception of nature and waterways. Living on a boat heightened her awareness of water flow, weather changes, seasonal cycles, and the fragile ecosystems along the canal. This unique experience inspired her to focus this year's festival theme on the waterways, with site-specific art and performances that not only showcase the beauty of the canal but also highlight its vulnerability in the context of climate change. Moreover, this experience connected her with a growing network of fellow boater artists, leading her to curate a special exhibition titled “Waterborne: Boater Art” within the festival.
Through self-reflection and practice, Chuntian explores how "art can serve as a tool for social change." She provides opportunities for collective community engagement through art, helping people find cultural and emotional belonging within the canal environment while also establishing a sense of home in a foreign land.
This interplay between self and society embodies the core principles of PAR: an individual's identity, experiences, and reflections are not merely additive values in cultural projects; they are essential drivers of change and sources of innovation. Through her experiences as a boater, her cultural background, and her artistic practice, Chuntian has shaped CDAF into a self-based cultural experiment that reflects her personal growth and deep understanding of the relationships among society, environment, and art.
Waterways as a Pathway for Future Growth, Water as a Medium for Cultural Exchange
Water is the core medium of the CDAF, connecting different cultures and disciplines while acting as a bridge for cross-cultural exchange. Artists create around the theme of water, exploring the relationships between people and nature, history and modernity, thereby fostering dialogue and collaboration across sectors. At the local festival, water not only symbolises diversity but also promotes connections between art, the environment, and communities.
On the international stage, in 2023, CDAF partnered with the Aranya Theatre Festival in China to launch a water-based artist exchange programme between UK and China. This initiative invited artists from both countries to engage in artistic creation and dialogue through waterways. British artists travelled to the seaside location of Aranya in China, immersing themselves in the local nature and culture; simultaneously, Chinese artists showcased their understanding and expression of water along the canals in London. This cross-cultural artistic exchange not only strengthened collaboration between Chinese and British artists but also transcended language barriers through the shared element of water, allowing their creations to resonate with new meanings and connections within different cultural contexts. In the autumn of 2023, during the LDF, CD hosted a diverse array of activities, including a cultural exchange exhibition Bodies of Water - Vienna Meets London. This event marked another waterway-based cultural exchange, connecting London’s Regent’s Canal with Vienna’s Danube Canal.
Looking ahead, CDAF plans to transform this festival into a linear water-based arts celebration throughout London, from Regent's Canal to the River Lea, with activity centres in places like King’s Cross, Paddington, and Hackney Wick. Through this expansion, CDAF will not only serve as a link connecting various cultural districts in London but also facilitate deep interactions between emerging artists and communities, achieving cross-regional cultural exchanges. The waterways will embody CDAF's vision, gradually weaving a network of innovation along the linear canals. This expansion will attract more young audiences, emerging artists, and participants from diverse cultural backgrounds, reinvigorating London's canals and driving ongoing artistic activities and projects. Additionally, CDAF's expansion plan will deepen its role as a tool for promoting social change, environmental awareness, and cultural revival, propelling future development along the waterways.
Chuntian's CDAF plays a transformative role in London's culture by seamlessly integrating art, community, and environmental awareness. By utilising the historic waterways, Chuntian redefines artistic engagement and demonstrates how art can serve as a catalyst for social innovation and environmental consciousness. Her background in service design and experience as a narrowboat dweller provide unique perspectives that foster connections between diverse communities.
Chuntian's commitment to inclusivity is reflected in her collaborations with various stakeholders and support for emerging artists. Through projects that incorporate principles of participatory action research, she encourages community involvement and emphasises art as a tool for change. CDAF not only revives the industrial heritage of London's canals but also inspires a new generation of artists and audiences to engage with their environment.
Looking ahead, Chuntian envisions the festival as a water-based celebration of the arts that promotes cross-cultural exchange and deepens community connections. Her vision reshapes the narrative of London's waterways, enhancing their significance as vibrant cultural conduits for the future.
