Miško vaikščiotojo metodas Forest Walker Method

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Here I am walking with my mum in the forest that is close to our home in a small village in Lithuania. It is my second time following someone into the forest for my research about forest paths, but first time in many years that I go mushroom picking with my mum. We havent done it since I was a kid. In this walk I am a daughter and local person, but I am also a researcher that observes how a person, my mum, interacts with the forest. I notice how she loses her way when we walk through the recently cut part of the forest. I notice – she stops just before entering the forest to silently greet it. I notice, that when we enter, she doesn’t take the first mushroom. I notice, how the path that used to be here, has grown, and is hard to walk to. When we approached a place, where the old oak trees were in the past, she remembers that mushrooms liked to grow there. I notice - her engagements with the forest happen through an object – a bag.

I will continue the story of people and forests through the bags.

Mushroom picking is probably the main way Lithuanian people engage with the forests. It is a lively tradition. I observed in my walk with Gintautas. He has walked the radius of about 20 km around his home and knows every corner, every pathway, every tree under which mushrooms grow. For him it’s matter of curiosity to find them. He never comes home without at least a few, and in the season brings buckets of porcinis. For that reason I made him a traditional Lithuanian basket from willows and hazel growing near his home, where we found a big porcini.

A little bag is meant as a small basket version that you can always keep in your pocket, if you find mushrooms on the way unexpectedly. It happened in many of my walks. There is a saying that if you find a mushroom, you cannot leave it because it stops growing – it’s your luck to take it.

In a most forested region in Lithuania, Dzūkija, mushroom and berry picking for a long time was one of the main means of living. The soils are not fertile for agriculture but the pine forests thrive. In these forests, there are many acidic swamps in which cranberries like to grow. There are so many there that villagers used to carry blankets to gather them. There were many paths in the swamps that are now disappearing as less people are walking there. I went there with Onutė, a local villager, who also became a chief ecologist of the swamp. It was a season of cranberry picking. She gave us small plastic buckets for picking. Inspired by them, I made a birch bark bucket from one of the fallen birches we encountered on the way. For thread and handle I used pine roots that I gathered with Romas.

Romas is a crafts educator from the same village. I met him for a first time a year ago to learn to weave willow bast shoes. This time I walked with him to the place where he gathers them. I noticed a very practical approach to the forest, but very human too – he handpicks the right willows, checks how they are growing, and when we went to gather pine roots, he was careful not to damage or take any roots he doesn’t need. He had a big sack to carry forest craft materials. I made him a big sturdy bag dyed with the bark of the willows that we visited.

Bag with wool inside is a plant carrier inspired by how Henrikas, a keeper of a botanical forest garden, gave a plant to plant at my home wrapped in moss and plastic bag. On his usual walks he tends for rare species he finds growing and plants more to diversify the forest and educate people.

The plastic bags that Ainis is carrying are full of various bottles to gather water samples from one of the oldest forests in Lithuania. He is an ecologist who works there to monitor health of the forest and its adaptability to climate change.measures rain, groundwater, and stream flow levels. I knotted and dyed this net bag for him.

And finally, a bag to carry yourself to the forest – a mat. I made it for my mum, who showed me places in the forest where she likes to sit, look at the pine tops and regain herself when she feels unwell. It is dyed with birch leaves from the birches we planted along our house when I was a child.

I call the people I met the Forest Walkers. Forest walking is different than just taking a walk, because there is something methodological about their walking – it’s regular, purposefull and relational. It doesnt matter if they are a scientist or a mushroom picker, or both, it is in the relation that they build with the places, that resist the dominant instrumental approach to the forest, something only to exploit. Active engagement with the places also resist the narratives of nature as something that is far away, something only to look at and preserve. The gap between forest use and forest preservation is quite a modern one and traditionally they were part of the same relationship, which themselves were more diverse across cultures.

I propose, that the relationship with forest, or nature broadly, could be regained and practiced through forest walking as a method – this action bridges this gap – of home and forest, need and responsibility, ways of knowing and experiencing.

I myself became a forest walker in the making process of the bags. I designed with the people and places to avoid generalization and decontextualization that often happen in product design. I made the bags fo specific people, the ones I walked with, based on my observations on their needs and behaviours, and after the project they will stay with them. I made the bags with the materials gathered around their forests to include the place in the design process. I started to walk regularly, purposefully and relationally, and found my own way of becoming a forest walker.

I have gathered the stories, maps, tips, suggestions and designed a guide to become a forest walker. Its structured by examples of different relationships people have with the forest that could invite and inspire to find your own. Vaikščioti netoli savo namų ir stebėti kas auga aplink. Vaikščioti reguliariai ir matyti, kaip ir kodėl laikui bėgant keičiasi kraštovaizdis. Iš pradžių vaikščiojant krepšio galbūt nereikia. Tačiau pradėjus vaikščioti į mišką tikslingai, pastebėti, kad gyvenime prireikė ir krepšio, ir miško. Rankomis ir rankiniais įrankiais rinkti tik tai, kas gausu, ir būti apribotam to, ko negalima rasti, pasiekti, panešti ar panaudoti. Rūpintis takais, vietomis ir tuo, kas reta bei trapu. Pastebėti, kad labiausiai vaikšomos vietos, kuriose takai pinasi į mazgus, yra ir reiškmingiausios.

Miško vaikščiotojas – žmogus, kuris ryšį su mišku užmezga ir palaiko per vaikščiojimą. Priešingai negu ėjimas tiesiog pasivaikščioti, miško vaikščiojimas yra reguliarus, tikslingas, ir santykiu besiremiantis veiksmas. Nesvarbu, ar žmogus yra mokslininkas, ar grybautojas, ar abu, jo dažnai ir atidžiai vaikštomi takai kuria jo asmeninį santykį su vietomis. Būtent toks santykis, atsiradęs tarp miško ir žmogaus jiems būnant kartu, priešinasi dominuojančiam instrumentiniam, abstrakčiam požiūriui į mišką – požiūriui, kad miškas yra tik ištekliai, kuriuos galima eksploatuoti, arba tik gamtinė ekosistema, kurią reikia išsaugoti nepaliestą žmogaus. Vaikščiojimas yra tas žmogiškas veiksmas, kuris sujungia namus ir mišką, poreikį ir atsakomybę, žinojimą ir patirtį – dalykus, kurie modernybėje dažnai traktuojami kaip priešingybės. Tiek išteklių gavyba, tiek aplikosauga dar neseniai buvo to paties – asmeninio, kultūrinio, lietuviško, sakralaus - miško ir žmogaus ryšio dalys, o miško vaikščiojimas, kaip metodas, kviečia tą ryšį atgaivinti ir praktikuoti ir šiandien. Krepšys šiame metode yra įrankis, kuris ledžia užmegzti materialų ryšį su mišku ir savyje talpina klausimą apie tai, kaip naudojame mišką. Kartu tai ir galimas atsakymas - galbūt tvarus žmogaus ir gamtos ryšys yra tas, kuris yra žmogiško mastelio, kurį galima nueiti savo kojomis ir pakelti savo rankomis?

Projektą sudaro trys dalys:
1. Video dokumentika, fiksuojanti Lietuvoje, skirtinguose regionuose vykusius pasivaikščiojimus kartu su vietos žmonėmis, gyvenančiais prie miškų. Filmuota iš nugaros, sekant iš paskos ir stebint, kaip jie mato, vaikšto, naudoja, saugoja mišką.
2. Patebėjus, kad kiekvienas vaikščiotojas turi savo krepšį, maišą, maišiuką, kuprinę, kurie, kaip jų įrankiai, leidžia jiems kažką veikti miške, kiekvienam sukurti asmeniniai krepšiai, pagaminti iš medžiagų, kurios buvo surinktos šiuose maršrutuose. Siekta naudoti kuo daugiau vietinių medžiagų, rastų namuose ir miškuose, ir pačius krepšius irgi palikti tose vietose, tiems žmonėms.
3. Gidas, kuriame surinkti miško takų žemėlapiai kviečia pačiam tapti miško vaikščiotoju.

Begaminant krepšius, sukurtus iš miškuose ir namuose rastų medžiagų, skirtus asmeniškai kiekvienam miško vaikščiotojui, aš irgi tapau miško vaikščiotoja. Fiksavau savo takus po miškus, kurie vedė mane prie medžiagų ir įkvėpimo, kuriais vaikščiodama susipažinau su beržais, karklais, pušimis, kerpėmis, skirtingais miškais ir žmonėmis. Šiuo metodu priešinausi produkto dizainui būdingam abstraktumui ir komercinei vertei, dizainui tik kaip prekei ar dizainui tik kaip menui. Kūriau dizaino manifestą, kurio pagrindas yra asmeninio santykio kūrimas su vietomis ir žmonėmis.