Centered on bringing to the fore the views of refugees whose voices are sometimes underrepresented, we kickstarted the AHRC-funded Decolonising Style and Textiles venture with an ethnographic analysis section involving key members of East London communities. From a twin place of cultural insiders and outsiders, we collected insights on the wants and aspirations of the taking part communities.
We invited Cecilia Casas Romero, Lecturer in Pictures and Social Design at ESDA in Spain, to facilitate ‘photo-voice’ workshops for London-based refugees and asylum seekers. The workshop briefs have been place-based and got down to showcase the members’ view of the world, their cultural heritage, on a regular basis life, and surroundings – prior and new. Working in teams at Rosetta Arts and Arbeit Studios Leyton Inexperienced, the members explored new methods to specific themselves.
“Francesco invited me to contribute to the venture at an early stage, and we determined to make use of photo-voice, a participatory methodology usually utilized in ethnographic analysis. I at all times undertake it with an inventive method, to provide different forms of outcomes.”
On the first set of workshops, every participant talked about locations the place they felt comfy and ‘at residence’. Some members talked about nature and greenery whereas others talked about actions, similar to portray and gardening. This conceptual train gave a glimpse into the members’ pursuits, aspirations, and lives, particularly earlier than they arrived within the UK and the way and the place they could have lived.
The subsequent exercise was a dialogue of the members’ pictures of conventional textiles or clothes from their residence nations, or ones they recognized with. These included pictures of the indigo dyed Ndop material used for conventional feasts in Cameroon, tremendous wax and Ankara wax resist materials utilized by Nigerian tribes, and Tally material with Amazighmotif in silver and gold on black from Higher Egypt. This train additionally gave rise to discussions in regards to the members’ various expertise in making.
A avenue images train was carried out the place every participant needed to decide a color and form after which seek for objects that represented these two issues in on a regular basis areas outdoor. The thought was to seek out that form and color by means of their perspective. This train contributed to “taking note of the element” and practising “the artwork of discovering one thing new within the outdated”, as said by some members.
A house project was given for the second set of workshops in three duties: to take images of issues present in London that felt just like the members’ nation, images of issues which can be completely different from their nation, and images of typical garments or textiles from their respective tradition. This train contributed to capturing a way of place, which is especially necessary for asylum seekers who’re new to London and nonetheless discovering their approach across the metropolis.
On the second workshop, the members have been supplied with varied supplies and have been invited to create a person collage that represented them. The exercise allowed the researchers and members to trade insights on their lives. As soon as every collage was completed, there was a bigger collective collage to finish.
One taking part asylum seeker favored the collage making exercise a lot that she saved practising it in her personal time collectively together with her daughter within the resort the place they’re staying. This evidences the ability of arts and craft to heal traumas and improve wellbeing.
Throughout one other session, Cecilia gave tips about learn how to take portraits successfully whereas the members photographed one another. All these duties supplied a protected and pleasant area the place expertise like communication and confidence could possibly be constructed upon.
One participant shared that the photo-voice workshops helped her to open her “eyes to see a flourishing world”, whereas one other favored the chance “to study completely different cultures and views by means of images”, and an additional participant said that she “gained a robust sense of group”.
For the ultimate session, members have been tasked to take self-portraits by means of reflections, for instance, on a window or a shiny object. The portraits have been printed for the cumulating showcase with each teams collectively at Rosetta Arts, the place household, mates and invited visitors may be part of the celebration.
On the collective showcase, everybody’s portrait, the self-portraits and the person collages have been displayed. The showcase supplied a spot to work together with folks from various backgrounds and study their cultures. Every participant and workforce member have been additionally invited to speak about their collage and their life by means of this depiction.
“In the long run, I unexpectedly found that ‘resilience’ is the characteristic that each one the taking part refugees and asylum seekers have in frequent. [Wherever] they arrive from, and for no matter cause they needed to flee their residence nations, they taught me a robust lesson of particular person and group resilience.”
This preliminary section of the venture supplied the members with an area to see themselves, not solely in a optimistic gentle being celebrated alongside work that they created, but additionally a possibility to share and speak about themselves in entrance of others who have been desperate to hearken to their story. This created a significant area that’s laborious to return by for these escaping harsh realities, battle and violence – those that are sometimes ignored and seen with damaging connotations whereas additionally coping with isolation in transitory worlds.
“By way of avenue images, portraits, and collage, we’ve got mirrored on our journeys, on the one fixed in life that’s change, and reminded ourselves to not be pushed by our issues, however to be led by our goals. It has been a very enriching expertise for everybody, to share tales, be taught new expertise, make connections, and feed hope for a greater future”
– Dr Francesco Mazzarella
