Here at The Resilience Project, we’re always looking for any opportunity to celebrate all the incredible young people leading the charge for climate justice. This holiday season, we’re inviting you to join us in honoring a changemaker you love!
Seeds of Change is a unique digital artwork that gives you the chance to give back while giving forward. By making a donation to The Resilience Project, you can have your loved ones name added to the growing piece. Each contribution plants a new metaphorical seed, helping new blooms unfold while empowering us to reach and support more young changemakers across the globe.
A digitised, mixed-media artwork, Seeds of Change is a beautiful keepsake created by young artist, Jade Johnson.
Born, raised and educated in the UK, Jade is an illustrator and animator of indigenous Taiwanese heritage. She has worked as a visual artist for several community organisations–including The Resilience Project–placing community engagement and social causes at the heart of her practice.
Jade strongly believes in designing for and with a community rather than at one, making her the perfect artist to bring Seeds of Change to life.
We caught up with Jade to understand a bit more about her practice, her inspiration, and what you can expect from the Seeds of Change artwork.
How would you describe your creative practice, and what values guide the work you choose to make?
“My practice moves between community-based art, illustration, and installation, always rooted in care, connection, and the act of remembering.
Much of my work explores what it means to belong to more than one place, and how art can become a way of returning to land, to ancestry, and to one another. I often create participatory spaces that invite others into processes of making, listening, and exchange. Whether through drawing, batik, weaving, or ceramics, I see craft as something living.”
As a young artist working at the intersection of community, identity and social justice, what role do you think art plays in movements like climate justice?
“Art plays a crucial role in climate justice, particularly in moments where traditional climate data fails to translate urgency into action. Art can function as a form of alternative data allowing us to visualise intangible pain through stories, colour and texture rather than cold figures.
As Lisa Bloom (2022) writes “ climate change is not simply about science or data but connected to environmental and social breakdown that takes many forms.”
What does creating this piece mean to you personally, and what are you most excited for people to notice as the artwork grows?
“Often the work I make for The Resilience Project is digital art, so it feels really special to be able to create something traditional using paint, pastels and collage. I’m excited for people to notice the humanness of handmade art, in the way that pastels are constantly disturbed by fingertips, in every leaf there is memory of human touch captured by the medium itself.”
What do you hope people feel — both the giver and the giftee — when they see their name as part of the artwork?
“I would love it if the giver and giftee see this as a contribution to a growing garden that is a visual celebration of our community. The names will be embedded within the leaves themselves, commemorating you as a living part of a growing, blooming ecosystem.”
How has your drive and passion to make the world a better place affected your mental health, and what kinds of things do you do to keep yourself healthy?
“This is a hard question to answer, there is always this fear that I’m not doing enough or that my energy could be redirected more productively to facilitate ‘ideal change’. What keeps me healthy is surrounding myself with people that inspire me, people who unapologetically challenge authority, people who truly care about change rather than the performance of it. People I know who would rally with me, would lead frontlines with nothing but their heart if they had to, but who would also have the gentleness to sit with me at my kitchen table and quietly scoop me an extra bowl of soup when the weight of it all gets too heavy. The same friends who will shout injustice to the sky but who can still hold me at my most vulnerable and who will dance with me until the birds wake up. It doesn’t just keep me healthy, it keeps me alive.”
We hope you’re as excited as we are to see Seeds of Change grow with every name added. Each contribution adds a new leaf and every tenth gift brings a new bloom to life, reflecting the collective power behind this movement.
If you’d like to receive a physical A5 print of Seeds of Change, you can do so by joining our £50+ monthly pledge tier, which includes exclusive benefits and a signed copy of Katie’s forthcoming book.
To receive a digital copy of the artwork to print at home, choose our £10 one-off gift, perfect for sending directly to someone you love.
In both cases, your loved one’s name will be added to Seeds of Change, Jade’s growing live artwork and proudly displayed on our website as part of a public celebration of climate care and community.
