People

• Aili Pyhälä (Permaculture Design teacher, socio-environmental scientist)
• Stefa Roth (Artist, Filmmaker, Dipl. Permaculture Designer)
• Eva Bakkeslett (Cultivator in the field of Arts & Ecology, Artist)
• Joana Bertholo (Artist, Author)
• Rebecca Egeling (Thinker Mover Maker)

Organizations

• TransitionNetwork
• Change the World
• Ecoartnetwork
• Grass Routes
• Permakultur Akademie Deutschland

People

Aili Pyhälä

Aili Pyhälä is a socio-environmental scientist specialised in sustainable natural resource use and hands-on participatory community development. With a B.Sc in Environmental Science and a Ph.D. in Development Studies, she continues to explore the spaces and linkages between the natural and human realms, always with a focus on sustainability. She has lived and worked around the world, including with several different indigenous communities (particularly in South America and Africa). In addition to her grassroots-level work, she has over recent years worked with national governments and inter-ministerial working groups in issues related to sustainable development, development cooperation, global responsibility, and biocapacity, particularly in Finland, Australia and the Andean Community.

Aili is currently researching questions related to global justice, sustainable communities, as well as solutions towards energy, climate and food security. Amidst her own research and occasional consultancies, she intermittently teaches permaculture courses (as a certified Permaculture Design teacher). Born in Mexico to Finnish parents, bred on four continents, and speaking seven languages, she considers herself a world citizen.

Stefa Roth (Germany/South America)

Artist, Filmmaker, Dipl. Permaculture Designer

Stefa is trained and gained experience internationally in different creative areas (acting, film, Tango Argentino). Her talents and interest made her engage in bodywork-techniques (massage, Shiatsu, Yoga) as well.
Being in nature and observing nature, the rhythms and patterns of it, is one of her most precious inspirations and teachers. Living and working on organic farms in France and Italy she got involved in Permaculture and Systems Thinking.
As everything naturally evolves in cycles, also a learning process is not a linear one, thus being an ever present aspect of Stefas life and work.
Integrating all this different approaches and knowledge, she is now working as artist and sustainability educator. Focus of her projects are the communication and implementation of an eco-centered, integrated way of experiencing, thinking and living.

Eva Bakkeslett (Norway)

Cultivator in the field of Arts & Ecology, Artist 

Eva Bakkeslett is a cultivator in the field of Arts & Ecology. She plants seeds to encourage social growth and environmental change, and cultivates her art with a desire to reenergize our engagement with, and sense of awareness of, the earth. Her passion lies in the interface between nature and culture, and using any suitable medium, she spends time in playful exploration and often contextualising her work by orchestrating interactive community events. Through these activities the subtle and invisible wonders of life reveal themselves, and through reconnecting with the infinite complexity and elegant beauty of our planet her work ultimately inspires and engages people to sense, feel, think and act.

http://www.evabakkeslett.com
http://evabakkeslett.blogspot.com
http://poeticsofbread.blogspot.com

Contact: bakkesle(at)online.no

Joana Bertholo (Portugal/Argentina)

Coming from a Graphic-Design/Fine-Arts background, Joana finds her favourite creative flown while writing. She is looking to experience an integral approach to art in her own life, contemplating dancing, music, traveling, being connected and dreaming - But ultimately, she writes. She has published 2 (fiction) books in her native Portugal, and the third one is due to be released soon. She hosts a blog on Social Design and contributes to like-minded blogs and magazines. She collaborates with several different projects and organizations, such as the SocialDesignSite, the INDEXawards, or Eloisa Cartonera.
She is currently in Buenos Aires, Argentina, conducting field work for her PhD on the potential of integral art practices in a macroshift scenario.

More: www.unscratchable.info

Rebecca Egeling (Germany/UK)

Photo: Shelley Castle

Thinker Mover Maker

BA in Classical and Contemporary Dance and Applied Theatre Studies
MA in Arts and Ecology

Rebecca researches by the means of her artform. She develops methodologies to physically explore questions of social and ecological concern.
The nature-culture, animal-human, body-city borderland provide the themes for her investigations which result in contextually engaged performance formats.

rebeccaegeling.blogspot.com

Organizations

TransitionNetwork

Transition Towns (also known as Transition network or Transition Movement) is a movement that was created by Louise Rooney and popularized by Rob Hopkins. It was founded in Kinsale, Ireland and was then spread to Totnes, England by environmentalist Rob Hopkins during 2005 and 2006. The aim of the project is to equip communities for the dual challenges of climate change and peak oil. The movement currently has member communities in a number of countries worldwide.

Change the World (Norway/Latin America)

Change the World has taken up the task of working towards real, hands-on processes of change from an integral and holistic perspective, promoting sustainable development from the grass-root. We use permaculture as a tool for the design of integral sustainable systems. This way we foment the establishment of ecovillages, eco-neighborhoods, eco-centers and other kinds of sustainable human settlements capable of being real, inspirational and demonstrative examples, bonding Man and Nature through social-ecology.

Ecoartnetwork (international)

We are a network of professionals dedicated to the practices of ecological art. We work across disciplines and within communities to:

• Focus attention on the web of interrelationships in our environment—to the physical, biological, cultural, political, and historical aspects of ecological systems;
• Create artworks that employ natural materials, or engage with environmental forces such as wind, water, or sunlight;
• Reclaim, restore, and remediate damaged environments;
• Inform the public about ecological dynamics and the environmental problems we face;
• Re-envision ecological relationships, creatively proposing new possibilities for co-existence, sustainability, and healing.

Our work is created to inspire caring and respect, stimulate dialogue, and encourage the long-term flourishing of the social and natural environments in which we live.

Grass Routes Association (Germany/Netherlands)

Grass Routes is an innovative, creative NGO evoking change towards a more green and sustainable society. Grass Routes connects organizations, social enterprises, blogs, media and community groups in Berlin and worldwide.

Permakultur Akademie Deutschland

The german permaculture academy provides courses, educational programs and lots of information on permaculture.