<p dir="ltr">Ethan has run health and wellbeing courses for over ten years, with clients including people with learning difficulties, various drug and alcohol rehabilitation services and a homeless hostel. He has also created a programme of wellbeing workshops, courses, therapies and other events, freely available to students. </p> <p dir="ltr">A wild swimmer and Dartmoor folklore aficionado, Ethan’s creative practice draws upon environmental issues, folklore, new materialism, storytelling and the Western Esoteric Tradition. His most recently published work was for ‘Sea Witch’s Companion’, by Levannah Morgan. This book about the spiritual power and beauty of the sea and moon discusses how practical magic and folk customs have been used to protect against the might of the sea, and to ward off the powers of storm and floods.<br /></p>

<p dir="ltr">Ethan is also a founding member of the <a href="https://www.iseu.space/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">ISEU</a> - The Inner Space Exploration Unit, a group with overlapping interests which include regional television, spectral cultures, edgelands and other-worlds. Members include academics and practitioners from Cambridge University and Arts University Bournemouth. Ethan and his fellow members of ISEU will be presenting their work at the international Trans-States conference in Northampton on Friday 9 September. The conference and art exhibition will explore the complex interrelationships between contemporary occulture, deception, persuasion, trickery, and sleight of hand.</p> <p dir="ltr">Ethan’s labour of love is his illustrated reference guide to the folklore landscape of Dartmoor. Alongside an illustrated children's book, it’s an ongoing project that encompasses the ancient fairy stories and legends of the unique, prehistoric moorland that surrounds Plymouth.</p> <p dir="ltr">Ethan said, "For me it’s a feeling of connection to the land and the non-human. Being open to beyond what we see on the surface and the sense of mystery that envelopes you on the moor. It is these tales that unite us in a common ancestry. I feel it particularly around Wistmans Wood on Dartmoor, it’s name derives from the dialect word 'wisht", meaning "eerie/uncanny" and it is associated with the Wild Hunt in Devon, whose hellhounds are known as Yeth (Heath) or Wisht Hounds in the Devonshire dialect.”<br /></p>

<p dir="ltr">“It is something that I try to draw on in my sessions with students. With the current ecological crisis the world is experiencing, along with Covid and how taxing that has been on people's mental health, there is almost a collective grieving going on - a heavy weight. One aspect of my approach to the work I do with students is helping them to reconnect with their own artistic purpose. By finding what it was that brought you here in the first place, what brought you to your course, they can reconnect back to their artistic purpose. I hope I can help them trust their inner feelings.”</p> <p dir="ltr">“It circles back to what inspires my own artistic interests. Dimpsy is a word in West-Country dialect that describes the half light as the day shifts to twilight. It’s a liminal state full of magical possibilities where the magical can come into contact with the human world. Where things are not always as they seem and fairy tricksters can come and play. For me Dartmoor is where I feel grounded.”</p> <p dir="ltr">“I try to encourage students to reconnect with this sense of curiosity, the childlike sense of play and enchantment that inspires them to make and create. It is so easy to lose the sense of wonder and interconnectedness of the natural world. I hope I can help them to trust their own feelings, to find their purpose and through this, the place where they feel they belong.”<br /></p> <p dir="ltr">Find out more information on what student support Arts University Plymouth has to offer on our <a href="https://www.aup.ac.uk/student-life/health-wellbeing">Health &amp; Wellbeing page</a>.</p>