ABOUT GREGORY & KOFFMAN
Natalie Koffman and Flora Gregory's collaborative relationship started while doing their MA in Social Sculpture and Connective Practice at Oxford Brookes University (2016-2018). They found a mutual interest in exploring the Human-Nature relationship.
‘Social Sculpture’ was coined by Joseph Beuys, a conceptual and performance artist and co-founder of the German Green Party. Beuys believed that everyone is an artist and that art had the potential to transform society.
Flora and Natalie’s current work, Nature Rights draws inspiration from the history of Human-Nature relationship, the groundswell of grassroots community environmental action and the Stop Ecocide movement.
As a child Flora often went walking in the woods to find her answers, she still does. Her studio is under a beautiful beech tree, a part of what remains of the ancient Wychwood forest, and she is Artist-in-Residence with the Wychwood Forest Project.
Apart from the woods she has a special relationship with Jack, an Arab gelding. They have been together for 20 years. They used to race and now walk slowly side by side, and he reminds her of many things she does not know.
Prior to her MA, Flora did a BA in Fine Art and Contemporary Practice at Middlesex University. As a social sculpture practitioner she looks at the human-nature relationship, at our increasing dislocation as we become urbanised, and the role of imagination and storytelling in transformation. Recent work includes 'Health and Well-being Dispensary', 'Join Us In Mesopotamia', 'Come and Lie In the Hay!', 'Do You Have A Special Relationship With an Other Than Human ?' , 'Nature Rights' and 'The Map Room: Wychwood Project' and 'Come Into The Woods'. https://www.axisweb.org/p/floragregory/
She is also an international documentary curator.
Natalie has always found peace and solace in nature and her practice is driven by a desire to gain a deeper understanding of humans and their relationship to nature and each other. A film she saw as a teenager, Koyaanisqatsi: Life Out of Balance, was a pivotal moment in awakening her understanding of the power of art to transform perception.
Natalie works with the mediums of photography, story telling, poetry, drawing and community food growing. Engaging with the principles of social sculpture, she investigates how art and the imagination can be vital means for addressing climate crisis and nature degradation, and envisioning new ways of being for an eco-socially viable future.
Natalie has a BA in Photographic Arts from London College of Communication and an MA in Social Sculpture. She works as a social sculptor practitioner, photographer, and in the areas of health and well-being. Recent socially engaged work includes '100:100:20' ' (In) Memoriam – The Alternative Jack the Ripper Walking Tour' 'Inventory of Stuff', '30 minutes to Pack a Bag', 'Seed', 'Hope Map', 'The Inverted Ark', 'Nature Rights' and 'One Seed Thousand Dreams'. She also works as a health and well-being practitioner.