Natalie Johns

I am a theatre-maker and director working across Hampshire and the UK. My background is in new writing and site-responsive performance; I ran High Hearted Theatre with writer Marcelo Dos Santos, making productions for Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse, Greenwich + Docklands International Festival, Southwark Playhouse, Brighton Fringe, Omnibus London and more. I currently work mostly in participatory practice and co-creation, creating work in collaboration with professional creatives and communities. I am also an artist-researcher with a particular interest in place, space and identity, and how theatre for social change.

I am a visual artist who works across a range of media, originally crochet and textile but more recently in sculpture, installation and performance. I have a sensory approach to connecting to materials, most of them domestic recycled waste. I am very interested in experimentation and cross collaborations with artists from other disciplines and also outside of the field of the arts. Across the years, my practice has delved into the visual and metaphorical links between neuroscience and crochet, the cracking and transformations of womanhood after the menopause and more recently the opening and reconnecting to nature.

I am Cultural Heritage Strategy Lead for the South Downs National Park Authority, working to ensure the ongoing conservation, enhancement and understanding of the heritage of this protected landscape, through collaboration with archaeologists and artists, museums and environmental charities. I am a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London and a, currently a member of the Arts Council England UK Museum Accreditation Committee and sit on the National Lottery Heritage Fund London & South Committee. My work with the National Park focuses on strategy, partnership and relationships, supporting organisations and networks with project development.