Join us from wherever you are in the world for a free global citizen art-science blitz July 19–27, 2025.
The Global GeoARTBlitz is a geography+art version of a bioblitz, which are regional or global events that encourage people to observe nature in a specific geography and upload their species observations to the citizen science appiNaturalist.
It will be fun: any time between July 19 to 27, 2025 go out in the field wherever you are and create a journal page, painting, poem, or music (any art) in response to your nature observations. Be sure to accurately record metadata: longitude, latitude, time, date, elevation, even weather.
You then upload your work to iNaturalist (more on that below). Our work will then will be mapped on clickable entries. If you create song or spoken-word art, record as a video to share, or contact the organizer for ways we can link to sound files. If you create visual art, poems or other written works, take a photo to share.
The Global GeoARTBlitz is hosted by the Royal Geographical Society Art of Exploration Collective,artists, naturalists, ecologists, and geographers dedicated to exploring nature and advocating for conservation through visual and other creative arts, from field sketching to poetry to fine art and music. The Collective is ever growing, and includes Alex Boon (UK), Anna Brewster (UK) Kirsten Carlson (Germany), Ali Foxon (UK), Rob and Harriet Fraser (UK), Tony Foster (UK), Claudia Myatt (UK), Tom Napper (UK), Heather Fortune (UK), Janet Rith-Najarian (USA) and Roseann Hanson (USA).
The results of the Global GeoARTBlitz will be shared with participants in the Royal Geographical Society's Explore Week, which we encourage you to attend if you can - October 27 - November 2. Find out more at https://www.rgs.org/events
How you take part:
1) Email me so I can put your on our database of participants and you can receive updates and I can contact you if we are going to use your entries in the Explore week presentations.
2) Download the iNaturalist app from your app store, create an account, and join the project there (if you want to use your phone to participate). If you use the app, click Projects at the lower right, and use the Search function to find “Global GeoARTBlitz 2025.
3) You can also create an iNaturalist account via a web browser https://www.inaturalist.org/ and participate by uploading using your computer.
Go to the GeoARTBlitz project page and join the group so your uploads will be seen in the GeoARTBlitz:
https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/global-geoartblitz-2025
4) Make your field sketches, poetry, song or other art and upload to the GeoARTBlitz Project any time between July 19 and 27, 2025—make sure you *add them to the project or they won’t show up!”
Questions? Contact Roseann Hanson, the organizer of the Global GeoARTBlitz.
Art of Exploration Collective mission statement:
Exploration and science are essential to understanding our world. And yet at times, scientific facts and conservation imperatives can be difficult to communicate to a broad audience, numbing them to ecological challenges.
Potawatomi botanist and author Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer tackles this in her writings, acknowledging that science lacks a bridge to ecological compassion. “For what good is knowing, unless it is coupled with caring?” she wrote. “Science can give us knowing, but caring comes from someplace else.”
Art in all its forms can be the bridge to caring. The mission of the Collective is to help build that bridge.
If you are in the UK, let us know, as there are several Art of Exploration Collective events being planned around London the week of October 27. Please get in touch and I’ll let you know when we have details.
Thank you for joining us in celebrating the art of field observations and recording nature through art.
