In Conversation: Heritage of Future Past
The three-day online event Heritage of Future Past curated by the British Council will highlight the value of cultural heritage and its contemporary relevance. Conversations will explore the links between heritage, history and power from the perspective of cultural workers who might continue to grapple with the vestiges of imperial legacies that remain in the Caribbean among other geographies.
Facing East with the Atlantic beyond the trees.
Happy to share that I was recently invited by the British Council to contribute to their ongoing discourse on heritage, history and power from the perspective of cultural workers who are continuing to grapple with the vestiges of imperial legacies which remain operational across the Caribbean, and among other geographies.
The three-day online event "Heritage of Future Past" will highlight the value of cultural heritage and its contemporary relevance. For tomorrow's morning session I'll share the importance of developing equitable exchange frameworks while reflecting on the wider "Difficult Conversations" exhibition series which I spearheaded at the NAGB in 2018. I will be conversing with the inimitable Lesley-Anne Welsh from Manifesto|Jamaica and David Codling. See the recording below, our panel starts at 1 hr 18 minutes.
More Information
Join the British Council for a series of three-morning sessions each exploring a different aspect of the impact and relevance of the UK’s Cultural Protection Fund. Monday, March 29th’s session will focus on: Place. Register and RSVP to attend here.
In this session we’ll journey from the UK to the Middle East, Asia to North and East Africa, and the Caribbean, collecting and sharing stories about the importance of place and identity. We’ll hear from Cultural Protection Fund projects, other heritage initiatives and contemporary artists and practitioners, discovering as we go that our heritage always starts in a place.
Confirmed Speakers:
Nicholas Laughlin - born and living in Trinidad, is programme director of the NGC Bocas Lit Fest, Trinidad and Tobago’s annual literary festival; editor of the arts and travel magazine Caribbean Beat; and a co-director of Alice Yard, a nonprofit contemporary art space based in Port of Spain. He has published two books of poems, most recently Enemy Luck.
Abu Amirah - is a Mombasa-based writer, AMLA (Art Managers & Literary Activists) Fellow, AWT (African writers Trust) Publishing Fellow, founding editor of Hekaya Initiative, a literary and cultural production platform publishing voices from the Swahili Coast, convener of the annual Swahili Literary Festival and proprietor of HAI Book Hub– Hekaya’s publishing imprint and bookstore.
Holly Bynoe - Bynoe is a curator, writer and co-founder of ARC Magazine, and is a graduate of Bard College | International Center of Photography. She is co-director of Caribbean Linked, a regional residency program held annually in Aruba supporting cultural exchange, and co-founder of Tilting Axis, the annual meeting charting arts activism, decolonial methodologies and models of creative sustainability across the region.
Lesley-Ann is the Founder and CEO of Anubis Communications, an agency dedicated to serving creators and socially conscious brands. She is also a Co-founder and Managing Director of Manifesto Jamaica, an NGO leveraging the arts and culture to teach adaptive 21st-century skills. is a development specialist and creative producer working at the intersection of culture, education, and the arts for over 10 years.
Annalee Davis is a visual artist, cultural instigator, educator and writer, with a hybrid practice. She works at the intersection of biography and history, focussing on post-plantation economies by engaging with a particular landscape in Barbados. Her studio, located on a working dairy farm, operated historically as a 17thC sugarcane plantation, offering a critical context for her practise by engaging with the residue of the plantation. She has been making and showing her work regionally and internationally since the early nineties.
Pablo Rosselló – Director Arts, Americas, British Council
Dr Tiffany Boyle is an independent curator and writer, part of the curatorial duo Mother Tongue, and a researcher based at The Glasgow School of Art in the Department of Design History & Theory. After studying in Dundee, Edinburgh and Stockholm, she received her PhD Art History from Birkbeck in 2020.
The session will be followed by a virtual exhibition showcasing work from Cultural Protection Fund projects.
Using footage, stories and presentations crafted by participants from the Middle East and Africa. The insights offer a flavour of the work from those delivering on the ground and the significance and impact for the communities closest to it. The insights in this event are connected by the concept of PLACE.
Heritage of Future Past is a three-day online event curated by the British Council, which will highlight the value of cultural heritage and its contemporary relevance. We will celebrate the work of projects supported by the Cultural Protection Fund as well as an exploration of the wider value of cultural heritage work. Bringing together an array of international voices we will examine different approaches to nurturing cultural heritage in ways that contribute directly to social cohesion and economic sustainability
Follow the event online and join the conversation using the hashtag #HeritageFuturePast