Jasmine's design responds to the theme ‘Mother Africa’, which explores the richness and reality of Africa before the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans; the impact of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and European colonialism on Africa; and considers and celebrates Africa’s present and future.

Beyond Time and Space celebrates the fecundity of African knowledge systems and imagination. Akan Gold weights, Ibeji-twin births, murmuration, cowrie currency, obus structures, navigation by stars, and Anansi together signify Africa’s rich cosmology. They embody the interwoven connections between the land, spirituality, craft traditions, biological hybridity, and even modes of exchange. Synergistically they stand across time, space, and species, crystalized in a philosophy that privileges harmony between man, nature, and celestial realms.

This offering is a retrieval – evocations of Africa – an invitation to a pathway to greater awareness of our magnificent ancestry. Awareness ultimately leads to our healing. We honour the past to transform our lineages backward, to grow, and create new pathways forwards. I hope that awareness of these unique elements of our potent legacy in the words of Kamu Brathwaite "will lead the community more easily into a wholesome relationship with the Ancient future and the approaching past.” 

Below are a few expanded themes: 

IBEJI-TWIN BIRTHS - Fertility

Carved wooden Twin figures at the British Museum led me to the discovery that the Yoruba peoples from the Congo region have the highest incidence of twin births in the world. I find this telling in a world of decreasing fragile fertility. An above-average number of twins is born on the African continent compared to other parts of the world. The Yoruba people as well as other African cultures attribute supernatural origins and spiritual power to twins. As a result, twins are regarded as extraordinary beings protected by Sango, the deity of Thunder. They are believed to be capable of bestowing immense wealth upon their families or misfortune to those who do not honour them. The two figures on the globe stand like sentinels to commemorate this astonishing biological gift. 

AKAN GOLD WEIGHTS 

Akan Gold weights were used as a measuring system by the Akan people of West Africa. These elegant objects were essential tools for trade in west Africa until the end of the nineteenth century. Beyond their practical application, the weights are emblems of tradition and social values carefully crafted to illustrate proverbs and folktale wisdom. They illuminate the intricacies of a complex society, keeping memories of battles, myths, and legends alive as an art form. Their significance transcends their utility and reflects wider Asante spiritual beliefs. They show how materials, ideas, and technology have been exchanged between different parts of the African continent and Europe for centuries. One of the main motifs on the globe, a replica of one of the gold weights, shows people on a boat traversing the vast ocean. This celebrates the insight of Ivan Van Sertima that Africans traveled across the oceans arriving in the Americas long before they were transported on slave ships. ‘They came before Columbus’ outlines these extraordinary voyages. African advances in agriculture, mathematics, arts, engineering architecture, writing, medicine astronomy, and navigation made audacious journeys across vast oceans physical and possible.

ANANSI and the architecture of the web. 

As engineers of possibility, Africans evolved their own advanced guidance systems to endure and survive treacherous crossings. This was a dialogue with the stars but more importantly, supported by ‘constellational thinking’ central to African cosmology and life. Anansi, the Spiderman-Akan God of Stories, Wisdom, and Knowledge and a central figure in west African folktales not only survived the voyage across the oceans from West Africa but consolidated African cosmology in the daily lives of Africans in the New World in our oral traditions. Anansi is best known for his ability to outsmart and Triumph over powerful opponents through his use of cunning, creativity, and wit. Anansi’s domain - the spider’s web has a complex and mysterious design that has exceptional strength and flexibility. It is stronger than steel almost invisible yet can survive winds that exceed hurricane strength. The psyche of Africans who survived the transatlantic trade in enslaved Africans like the spiderweb is resilient and indestructible. Like the strand of a spider’s web, it is made up of infinite diaphanous strands of ancestral frequencies. I believe that our resilience and identity continue to be nourished by this ancient wisdom. It reverberates in our music, spiritual practices, food, architecture, and in every imaginable facet of Life. 

MURMURATION

Murmuration is an extraordinary natural phenomenon where a huge mass of black sweeps across the sky. This spectacular movement is of birds moving in concert, swirling, surging, and constantly changing form. The shifting patterns and rhythm of the birds are a remarkable force of nature. The birds fly in intricately coordinated patterns through the sky to maintain cohesion as a group in highly uncertain environments to protect the collective flock. Black is the colour of darkness and mystery, the unseen and unknown. A bird in flight can represent the connection between the physical and the spiritual.” Birds of a feather flock together” describes a simple survival instinct, a strategy similarly exercised by the people of Africa. This unity is manifested in the principle of UBUNTU - I am because you are. Ubuntu is an eternal African Philosophy of ‘Oneness’ - this oneness is an understanding of the interconnectedness of all life. 

COWRIE SHELLS 

The cowrie shell was one of the most successful and universal forms of currency in the world. In West Africa, the shell developed a deeper symbolic and ritualistic meaning throughout history that is still recognized in modern cultures. The size, shape, and minimal weight of the small white shells made them suitable as a form of exchange. Cowrie shells hold great symbolism. In African legend, it represents the protective power of the Ocean Goddess Yemaya. Their rounded shape is attributed to their connection to fertility, and the slit where the shell curves inside of itself has been said to look like a black pupil, making it popular as a symbol of protection against the evil eye. It is used as a divination tool in traditional spiritual practices.

Jasmine Thomas-Girvan was born in1961 in Jamaica and has lived in Trinidad since 2000. A sculptor, trained in jewellery and textile design, she received her BFA from Parsons School of Design in New York.

https://www.jasminethomasgirvan.com/

Rodell's design responds to the theme ‘Mother Africa’, which explores the richness and reality of Africa before the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans; the impact of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and European colonialism on Africa; and considers and celebrates Africa’s present and future.

My inspiration for this piece was a combination of painting and photographs redrawn and repainted. I have created a montage of paintings, drawing and paper works using spray paint, Posca pens and photocopies.

My intention was to create an image that was stark and bold with facts and quotations for the viewer to ponder and consider about the ramifications of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and its damming legacy. I wanted something more graphic and poster-like, with the use of paintings and photographic mash ups.

Rodell Warner (b. 1986) is a Trinidadian artist working primarily in new media and photography. His works have been exhibited at The Whitney Museum of American Art in the 2016 Dreamlands exhibition as part of the collective video project Ways of Something, and at The National Gallery of Jamaica in the 2016 exhibition Digital, and at the 10th Berlin Biennale in 2018 in I’m Not Who You Think I’m Not #14. Rodell is a recipient of the 2011 Commonwealth Connections International Arts Residency, and the 2014 summer residency at NLS Kingston, and was commissioned in 2017 to create the Davidoff Art Edition, a series of five artworks printed onto a limited edition of five thousand boxes of luxury cigars and presented and sold at Art Basel in Hong Kong, Miami, and Basel. Rodell lives and works between Port of Spain in Trinidad, Kingston in Jamaica, and Austin, Texas, in the US.

http://www.rodellwarner.com

Jay's design responds to the theme ‘Mother Africa’, which explores the richness and reality of Africa before the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans; the impact of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and European colonialism on Africa; and considers and celebrates Africa’s present and future.

For this commission, I have been deeply inspired by my time in the London Lucumi Choir, where we sang songs to the Orisha (Yoruba gods and goddesses) alongside my own spiritual interests in the concept of ‘The Divine Feminine’, an archetypal deity that appears throughout all world cultures. I bring this back to the Mother Africa theme, by relating it to the three most famous Orisha of the Pantheon: Yemaya, Osun and Oya.

Yemaya (Mother of Oceans) represents the older Mother. She is gentle and nurturing, and like many Divine Feminine figures is also full of power, exerting her rage when necessary. She represents the ‘new world’, where African diasporic women have had to learn to be both nurturer and protector.

Osun represents the young Mother, full of energy, naivete, sweetness and softness. She represents the old world, before many of our ancestors were taken. Sweet innocence and true connection with nature.

Oya bridges the two, representing the middle passage. Oya is a Warrior Goddess. Our ancestors had to be strong in the middle passage – Maroons, renegades, warriors.

All three energies represent Mother Africa. African diasporic women such as I have had to tap into these energies throughout our lives to survive in this world.

Finally, Ghanaian Adinkra symbols, beautiful in gold, represent the qualities we have found amongst our communities as women, to keep moving forward through adversity:

• Sankofa: learning from the past
• Asese ye duru: divine mother earth, sustaining life,
• Bese Saka: abundance, plenty, togetherness
• Akoben: battle cry
• Aya: hardy fern, grows despite difficulty
• Akoma: patience, tolerance
• Wawa aba: toughness and perseverance
• Nkonsonkonson: a reminder of strength in community.

For Jay, art is a primal practice that connects us to Ancestral Strength, Sacred Healing and the Divine Cosmos. Growing up in East London, Jay was surrounded by a multicultural environment, and a close proximity to Epping Forest. 

From her time spent in forests and taking trips to the beaches of her ancestral home Antigua, Jay possesses a long-lasting love for divine nature. This theme is present throughout her artwork, where she makes romantic references to water and flora. An Obeah woman and Spiritworker, Afro-Caribbean cosmologies lie at the forefront of Jay Percy’s psyche and art. 

Themes include African diasporic loss of indigenous spirituality, in addition to reminders of the strength we can all find by reconnecting with the animist practices respective to ancestral homelands, prior to colonisation.

 Jay works with acrylics and hand sews cowries and crystals directly onto canvas. She combines her love of highly saturated colours and royal golds with African Orisha worship, psychedelic print, and a fundamental belief in the right to explore one’s own consciousness.

Website

Emma’s design responds to the theme ‘Mother Africa’, which explores the richness and reality of Africa before the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans; the impact of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and European colonialism on Africa; and considers and celebrates Africa’s present and future.

The Courageous Untold Stories of African Environmental Heroes & Sovereignty Guardians.

My globe responds to the Mother Africa theme and utilises key symbolism and references that highlight and reimagine much of the inspirational parts of global history, where the untold stories of African environmental heroes and sovereignty guardians are centred. Inspired by the eclectic aesthetics, textures and history of the continent, I’ve incorporated my ‘Naturtraits’ style, which distinctly illustrates the connection between humans and nature through collaged silhouettes. 

Each section brings to life reimagined parts of our pre-colonial, traditional and colonial history as well as our present day reality and future potential. It aims to honour those who bravely fought for justice and our rights by reimagining them depicted in the dignity and peace in death that they didn't always receive while alive, and to celebrate those who are paving the way for a brighter future. Despite representing a small percentage of the global population, indigenous people protect the vast majority of the world’s biodiversity. 

By focusing on the significant environmental legacy across the continent, it brings to light many of the courageous stories of those who have dedicated their lives to protecting the biodiversity of our richly diverse lands and as well as our rights to a healthier, greener life – preserving it for future generations. Likewise, this same approach honours the untold stories of our sovereignty guardians, who showed bravery in times of great vulnerability, as well as the significance of our global pre-colonial influence – a reminder of our potential and worth outside of Western context. 

Untold stories features the next generation of environmentalists, represented by Vanessa Nakate and brave ancestors like Ken Saro-Wiwa, president of the Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People who was executed in response to their activism against oil extraction in Ogoniland. 

It also features stories of great rulers, from the diasbled Queen Amanirenas of Kush and her legendary golden arrows and influence of Mansa Musa to traditional legacies, such as Àdìǹkrá symbols and Griots who keep traditions alive to this day.

With almost a decade in the creative industry, Emma Blake Morsi is an award-winning Multi-Disciplinary Arts Producer, Non-Executive Director of Rising Arts Agency and former Bristol City Council’s Culture Board member. She’s a prolific visual storyteller, predominantly working across photography, words, graphics, film, events and sound. 

Born in Nigeria and Bristol-raised, she has previously lived in Germany and worked internationally across the Middle East to Africa, with commissions by Arts Council England, Method, gal-dem, Bustle, Saffron, Youth Music, BBC, Harper's Bazaar, PUMA and many more. As a creative intersectional environmentalist following years in STEM, her research consisted of developing a sustainable circular system repurposing waste substances to using hybrid tools for creating inclusive nature-inspired experiences. 

Morsi challenges approaches to inclusion and innovation in the spaces she works, producing work that can be experienced by all but most importantly gives visibility to and engages those from marginalised groups.

www.emmablakemorsi.co.uk

Donna's design responds to the theme ‘The Reality of Being Enslaved’, which makes real the experience of those people who were enslaved, from their capture, captivity and voyage to lives and deaths enslaved in different contexts, places and generations.

This design responds to the theme The Reality of Being Enslaved and in particular the story of Voyage. Whilst researching my design, I came upon the poem Slavery written by Hannah More, one of the most prominent female writers championing the abolitionist cause in eighteenth century Britain. I was particularly drawn to the lines of the poem which referred to light and darkness. 

I was reminded of the slave ships, or ‘Guineamen’ as they were known, and the horrific realities of the tortured human cargo crammed into their dark hulls. My design references the great maritime art of the eighteenth century and presents a subverted view of the golden age of sail. The glorious ships with their billowing white sails bathed in sunlight stand in stark contrast to what lies beneath. 

The base of the globe has been inspired by the 1791 Brookes slave ship diagram – one of the most recognisable images from the campaign to abolish the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans in Britain – which provided the public with a clear visual representation of conditions on board slave ships for the first time. From a distance the base appears as a pattern but on closer inspection the figures of the enslaved are revealed. 

Extracts of the poem wrap around my globe design, delivering a visual metaphor for the abundant wealth and pleasure that the sweat of the dead has procured for others.

Donna Newman is the Artist behind Eden-Designs Murals.

A freelance artist based in the Midlands, she has been working as a professional muralist and painter for over 15 years. Donna responds to clients with creativity and flair producing original, playful designs in a wide variety of subjects. Working predominantly as a commissioned artist within school settings, she seeks to inspire young people by transforming their learning environments with her vibrant artwork. 

Her unique and innovative designs always seek to educate through their creative interpretation of the curriculum and she often works directly with school groups to create bespoke artwork through collaborative children’s art workshops. A self-proclaimed addict of public art trails, Donna has worked closely with Wild in Art on over 50 sculpture commissions.

http://www.eden-designs.co.uk

Susan's design responds to the theme ‘The Reality of Being Enslaved’, which makes real the experience of those people who were enslaved, from their capture, captivity and voyage to lives and deaths enslaved in different contexts, places and generations.

Water has been the conduit of oppression and displacement for millions of enslaved African peoples. Vast oceans have also been witness to the deaths of many of those lives as they sunk to their deaths in water’s formless grave. The thought of using water came to me from watching a television clip of a rushing river. Water has played a large part in the world's history. 

It is an essential part of our existence and affects all of us. I thought, ‘What if the oceans could talk to us? What stories would they tell?’ They would be an impartial witness and narrator to the world's history. There is a belief by some scientists and researchers that water holds memory. 

How might that be affected by all the millions of enslaved African peoples who lost their lives at sea? Most of our bodies are water. We are all part of that shared eternal cycle of death and renewal. 

The teardrop is a symbol of the many tears that have been shed: are still being shed and for the many tears that will be shed in both despair and joy for our shared humanity.

Susan Thompson is an abstract painter based at Kindred Studios, London. Her interest in art started in childhood. Although she has spent the majority of her working life nursing;‌she has always made taken time to engage in some form of art making and further education.‌ ‌This‌ ‌has‌ ‌included‌ ‌completing‌ ‌an‌ ‌Art‌ ‌Foundation‌ ‌Course‌ ‌at‌ ‌the‌ ‌Camberwell‌ ‌School‌ ‌of‌ ‌Art‌ ‌in‌ ‌1984,‌ ‌an‌ ‌Art‌ ‌Therapy‌ ‌Postgraduate‌ ‌Diploma‌ ‌at‌ ‌Goldsmiths‌ ‌College‌ ‌in‌ ‌1990‌ ‌and‌ ‌more‌ ‌recently,‌ ‌a‌ ‌BA‌ ‌Hons‌ ‌Fine‌ ‌Art‌ ‌Degree‌ ‌at‌ ‌Oxford‌ ‌Brookes‌ ‌University‌ ‌in‌ ‌2014.‌ ‌

www.riseart.com/artist/126886/susan-thompson

Glen and Jane’s design responds to the theme ‘The Reality of Being Enslaved’, which makes real the experience of those people who were enslaved, from their capture, captivity and enforced voyage to lives and deaths enslaved in different contexts, places and generations.

Our globe, which responds to The Reality of Being Enslaved theme, is a cotton ball which represents the enormous harvest expected daily by each enslaved person who worked on a cotton plantation. After the cotton gin was invented by Eli Whitney in 1793, the value of cotton soared and the industry grew rapidly. Although cotton itself is soft, it is surrounded by a hard and thorny structure that would cut the hands and legs of the workers, many of whom were children as young as eleven, who were considered to have the ideal height and hand size for picking. After a day of 12 to 18 hours each person's harvest was weighed. There were severe consequences if the person did not meet the expectations.

The red in our design represents the blood shed in this industry. From 1800-1860 enslaved African Americans harvested 2 billion pounds of cotton. Almost all of the 80% exported to Europe went to Britain where it was made into cloth and re-exported. Cotton was the most important raw material of the Industrial Revolution which was instrumental in creating our modern world economy.

We want this globe to commemorate the humanity of those enslaved. We hope for public awareness and appreciation of the terrorism that was unleashed against millions of enslaved African men, women and children. We wish this to be a meditative memorial which considers and commemorates each life lost to the oppressive pursuit of the cotton cash crop.

Glen is a freelance artist and has worked professionally as a Fine Artist/Scenic Artist in the corporate and design industry. Glen also worked for Damien Hirst at his studio, and he regularly completes commissioned artworks for The Connor Brothers in London.

Jane Mota is a concept and written word artist with a degree in Fine Art as a Social Practise and English Literature. She creates concepts that are influenced by a lifetime of study in art and cultural history, a curious mind that explores and moulds her influences to bring a new present day relevance.

Her influences are very varied, from the Renaissance era to the DaDA period and aspects of Modernism from art and literature. She travelled for many years and became fascinated by her experiences with other world views and world cultures. 

Jane works closely with her partner Glen Brooks, and at this point collaborates, where Glen Brooks exquisitely brings Jane’s ideas and initial sketches and ideas to their final splendid destination. Glen meticulously plans and executes the technical side, the painting or mixed media to produce the final piece on either sculptural or flat spaces. Alone she also enjoys writing funny entertaining stories about her travels on facebook, finding freedom through her personal creative style. 

Godfried's design responds to the theme ‘The Reality of Being Enslaved’, which makes real the experience of those people who were enslaved, from their capture, captivity and voyage to lives and deaths enslaved in different contexts, places and generations.

The inspiration for my globe was the theme The Reality of Being Enslaved. I started by looking at, and thinking of, all the enslaved peoples of the world – currently, from antiquity and throughout history – and trying to imagine the most important preoccupation that they would have: namely, and by any means necessary, to flee from that state and take flight towards the ideals to which all humans aspire.

Godfried Donkor is a Ghanaian artist, living and working in London, who has exhibited in Cuba, Mexico, the US, Europe and Africa. He is known primarily for his work in collage, and has been described as similar to Keith Piper and Isaac Julien in his output. He is a multidisciplinary artist interested in the socio-historical relationships of Africa, Europe and the Caribbean. Donkor also has enlarged his practice to painting studying the relationship between slave trade and boxing in his exhibition with Gallery 1957 in 2021, London, UK. Godfried’s work for Denmark Hill station marks the artist’s first permanent public commission. He worked with a wide range of local partners – including the Camberwell Ident

http://donkor.net/

Geoffrey's design responds to the theme ‘Expanding Soul’, which celebrates the spirit and culture of the African diaspora that, even in the face of incredible suffering, has endured and found vibrant expression across the world in music, art, food and so much more.

The dreams of those who sailed across the sea

Shine Bright

The dreams of souls in the belly of the beast

Shine Bright. 

Shine Bright inverts our gaze to evoke an uninhabited space in our imagination. Here, down is up, west is east. A new perspective, a dislocated world view for Africa and the Atlantic, familiar yet not so. We know this place, but in this altered globe there is a shift in relations, a rubbing against the nominative imposition of our identities, our cultures, our texts, our histories, our nations and our attachment to them. 

Do we still belong, do we still own these nominative identities? Do you see it, do you touch it, feel it, east is west. Mother sea and Father land. Freedom dreamt as property is today’s lived emancipated joy? 

European histories and colonisation are dark fictions in an Afrosurrealist future where the traces and formations of a transatlantic culture have become the cultural metres of the planet. The inverted globe subverts our gaze and sense of belonging to the earth as we know it, and the only mapping other than the dark sea and the red earth is the appreciation of the cultural texts created by the descendants of those who made the transatlantic journey in chrome. 

This appreciation is the shining of Samba, of Salsa and Soul, it is the shining of Blues, Bebop and Boogie, Reggae, Jazz, Calypso, Funk, Afrobeat, HipHop and Carnival. All shine brightly on the earth. Caporiera and the legacies of Gospel, Vodun, Santeria, Candomble and Jazz, Jerk, Jambalaya and Gumbo glisten and migrate across the earth; to Europe, the Americas, Asia, Oceana as well as the cultural return beat to Africa. 

We sparkle, diamonds in the blackness of the Atlantic, diamonds sprinkled on the blood red lands. Shine bright.

Born in London of Caribbean heritage, Geoffrey is an expanded arts practitioner based in Margate and is steeped in the traditions, histories and culture across the Caribbean, Atlantic and Britain. He has a dynamic, multidisciplinary practice including mark making, performance, film and installation with a focus on Afrosurrealistic cultural texts which explore the relationship and assumptions surrounding cultural belonging, migration, identity and race through creating reparative formations.

Winner of the inaugural Brixton open in 2002, he migrated to Brazil in 2005, he was a founder reggae collective ‘Dread in Brazil’ in the favelas of Salvador from 2008 - 2012. His short film ‘Prove it’ was shown at the 2012 Cannes film festival. Becoming bilingual, he studied painting at MAM in Salvador Brazil in 2013 and drawing at the Honolulu Museum of Art in Hawaii USA, in 2014. Returning to the UK in 2015, where he exhibits regularly. Writer and director consultant of the 2016 4 part BBC documentary, ‘Black is the new black’. 

He gained a masters degree in Race, Media and Social Justice, at Goldsmiths University 2019, which focussed on Afro-futurism and the Afrosurreal as cultural texts. He continues his practice and teaches mark making at the people dem collective in Margate.

http://www.geoffreychambers.com

Kione’s design responds to the theme ‘Stolen Legacy: The Rebirth of a Nation’, which brings to life how Britain was transformed and enriched as a result of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and the free labour of the enslaved. It explores the legacy of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans in building the financial and trading power of Britain; strengthening the Church and the might of universities; and establishing dynastic influence and power.

‘Mama Africa' represents the common ancestor of all people of African descent. I wanted to depict her as a warming presence, adorned with jewels, beadwork, scarification markings, and an afro comb placed within her hair. She represents the rich culture and spirit of Africa, which was disregarded and somewhat forgotten through the forced displacement and enslavement of generations of African people.

I wanted to show the wealth of Africa before the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans, and the beauty that still lives on. The opposite side of the globe represents Britannia, a warrior-like figure who often represents the power and national pride in Britain. Here, her helmet is adorned with cotton, her trident replaced with a sugar cane, and her shield with the interior plan of a ship built to transport the enslaved; to acknowledge Britain’s disregard for humanity, and the true history that was the engine of Britain’s economy up until the nineteenth century. 

Between these two portraits, I have depicted Matilda Mcrear, the last known survivor from a ship transporting the enslaved, whose birth name was Abake, meaning ‘born to be loved by all’. Matilda was captured in West Africa, illegally sold at the age of two and taken to Alabama on the ‘Clotilda’, the last known ship to bring enslaved Africans to America, in 1860. Matilda died in Alabama in 1940 at the age of 83, neither having received reparations despite her efforts, nor returning to Africa. Matilda is remembered by her family as having scarification markings of the ‘Abaja’ type on her left cheek, indicating that she came from the Yoruba tribe. I have depicted Matilda seated upon a beaded Yoruba throne.

Opposite Matilda, the final part of my globe is a depiction of the wealth received by enslavers in order for abolition to have taken place. 46,000 enslavers were compensated twenty million pounds – the equivalent of seventeen billion pounds today. British taxpayers only finished paying off this debt in 2015. Let us not forget.

Kione Grandison is a London-based, multi-disciplinary artist with a strong cross-cultural practice that spans across various interests, influenced by her Jamaican, German and British heritage. Working across different forms and media, Grandison produces paintings, mixed-media collages, sculpture, hand- painted clothing and nail art. Her work is interested in numerous subjects – from the Black beauty industry, Jamaican music and dancehall culture to traditional African adornment and tools of ‘beautification’, such as the hair comb.

www.kionegrandison.com

Leon's design responds to the theme ‘Stolen Legacy: The Rebirth of a Nation’, which brings to life how Britain was transformed and enriched as a result of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and the free labour of the enslaved. It explores the legacy of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans in building the financial and trading power of Britain; strengthening the Church and the might of universities; and establishing dynastic influence and power.

As our motorways are busy today, so once was the Atlantic Ocean’s triangle of trade routes between Britain, Africa and the Caribbean. 

The plunder of Africa’s gold, diamonds and people – taken to either the Caribbean or England – created great wealth for many men, such as Edward Colston in Bristol. As for the jewels in my design, large jewels have long been associated with the British monarchy. The arrows on the globe have texture to replicate dry blood from the skin of many millions of enslaved people who were beaten, tortured and killed during the TransatlanticTrade in Enslaved Africans. To have just sprayed red and gold paint on with a smooth finish felt wrong, when those journeys were far from smooth for the enslaved. 

There is a stitch – just one – which just says we are all the same underneath; can you find it?

All arrows – all the money – point to England, whose wealth grew over the centuries of exploitation. Bristol became one of the biggest centres of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans. How many buildings which adorn our city of Bristol were built by money from this trade? Even after the Abolition Act in 1834, enslavement carried on, with some British ships going under European flags and joining with foreign companies for many decades thereafter. 

There are three different types of ship on this globe; it’s for you to find them, see the difference, and make up your own mind as to what this means.

Emotions have run high during the process of making this piece. I have come to tears sometimes trying to put myself in the situation that so many enslaved people were forced to endure. If this shows a fraction of what those people went through, don’t thank me, salute them for their bravery in the face of suffering: they were the true warriors.

The works of Leon Miller, BS51, reflect his life journey. From The Wild Bunch blasting in the abandoned warehouses of Bristol to his first jobs collecting glasses for every pub in King Street, these experiences have shaped how he approaches his art practice.

He explains that his breakdowns have shaped him as an artist. His fellow artist and friend FLX, Felix Braun, taught him how to do a stencil when he was going through his divorce and struggling to manage this personal crisis. His stencils and murals talk about his Caribbean heritage since his grandmother came from Jamaica in the 1950's, as well as the most intimate tribulations of the artist/decorator. BS51 describes his creative process as a jigsaw, but backwards. Everything starts with an image which is digitalised or drawn, he then uses a scalpel to cut specific segments that will eventually become stencils and build the entire piece.

After that breakthrough with stencils, BS51 has had incredible commissions including advertising walls for Love Saves The Day Festival, Toyko Dub, and Windrush on Camber Street for St Pauls Carnival. Several of his pieces adorn walls in his home, along with some of his friends’ works from ‘Team Shlick’, a hub of collaborators and creators that BS51 formed with other famous names like 3DOM, Inkie, DNT and many more.

Alison's design responds to the theme ‘Stolen Legacy: The Rebirth of a Nation’, which brings to life how Britain was transformed and enriched as a result of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and the free labour of the enslaved. It explores the legacy of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans in building the financial and trading power of Britain; strengthening the Church and the might of universities; and establishing dynastic influence and power.

My design for the theme Stolen Legacy: Rebirth of a Nation will hopefully encourage the viewer to question their perspective on the history of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans. 

I wanted to depict society being physically 'held' by the hands of an enslaved person, saying 'Don't forget us, our sacrifice is at the very soul of the society of which you are a part.' I want to highlight the fact that our nation was created out of suffering and revisit the misplaced legacy towards the slave traders who benefitted from the barbaric treatment of the people they traded. 

Mosaic itself is diverse by its very nature. Using glass, pottery, ceramic tile, mirror and vintage crockery, I have included buildings in the cityscape which have specific and direct links to the slave trade including Speke Hall, Bristol Old Vic, Guinea Street and The Georgian House. The hands of the slave are edged in spent bullet casings to encourage the onlooker to consider the suffering and sacrifice made by the thousands of lives that were traded and disregarded...this globe is for them. To honour and remember exactly who built our society. 

Together we can look back and relearn history from another perspective in order to understand the generational effect slavery has had on our ancestors and in turn, improve our future. May we always remember the roots of the foundation of society for it has blood running through its veins. Hand Model - With thanks to Nathan Oladipo.

Alison Turner is a professional mosaic artist known for her quirky approach to mosaic art. She creates artwork for gallery exhibitions, private collections and public installations. Describing herself as an “Artistic Recycler” Alison sets stone next to broken pottery, discarded ceramics next to glass thus creating eclectic work that will be admired for years to come.

www.alisonturnermosaics.co.uk

Kassessa’s design responds to the theme ‘Stolen Legacy: The Rebirth of a Nation’, which brings to life how Britain was transformed and enriched as a result of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and the free labour of the enslaved. It explores the legacy of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans in building the financial and trading power of Britain; strengthening the Church and the might of universities; and establishing dynastic influence and power.

Part 2 of a series AFROPINK.

My globe concept is based on the legacy stolen from African people. With my work I suggest that we still feel the scars from the inhumane treatment of humans during this time which I believe has led to a loss of self-love for Africans.

In this painting I feature boats that crossed the Atlantic and I show people in the water, thrown overboard. I want to draw attention to the loss of life and the insurance policies that were used to protect the slave owners and transporters, not the enslaved people. Despite the fact that the enslaved people were humans, and therefore priceless, they were treated as cargo.

I wish that the world will start looking at Africans with fresh minds and love this great continent - its people and cultures. 

My colour palate has different shades of pink as the dominant colour tone and I thought about the idea of Afro Pink which speaks to the love I want to send to Africa, to Africans, to everyone.

Kassessa is a visual self-taught artist from Angola. From an early age, he was interested in art and developed a great passion for creating plays, toys and art crafts. He creates different concepts and translates them into different artistic expressions through live events – stages and exhibitions – or through printed, digital, sculpture and painted mediums.

He enjoys working with different materials and he expresses himself through his art, highlighting and bringing awareness to different societal issues and the people they affect.

Laura's design responds to the theme ‘The Reality of Being Enslaved’, which makes real the experience of those people who were enslaved, from their capture, captivity and voyage to lives and deaths enslaved in different contexts, places and generations.

I conceived the idea for my creation enriched by my experiences of growing up in Liverpool which was inspired by Liverpool’s deep heritage and by poignant visits to the International Slavery Museum. 

The powerful accounts that were given about how people were taken from their beds in the middle of the night to embark on what is referred to as the ‘middle crossing’ has been ingrained in my memory. The design pays homage to the importance of the sea and the claustrophobic encounters as described by the people. The street names in Liverpool that link directly to the ‘slave masters’ have been graffitied on the rocks. Along with the anchor, the chains are embedding the rocks firmly into the sea bed. In some of the rocks one can identify human forms which have been depicted in close proximity to one another. 

My design acknowledges the okra flower as being a symbol of hope and the courageous work of Nanny of the Maroons. It reminds us all that during time’s of great adversity there is always a glimmer of hope and light – portrayed by the light penetrating the surface of the sea.

Laura is an extremely passionate painter and her work is rich in narrative. Laura attempts to challenge people’s emotions and to inspire the notion that through creating art we can both educate and liberate ourselves. More recently she has dedicated time to developing her skills in photography using both traditional and contemporary methods. She has pursued a career in teaching and alongside this has continued to develop her own studio practice, recently winning the accolade of ‘most realistic and most creative’ submission to ARU’s ‘Sweet Anatomy’ Competition, as judged by Grayson Perry. Additionally, Laura is no stranger to producing public artwork. She has contributed successfully to the ‘Go Penguin trail’, ‘Liverpool Greats’ and the ‘Books about Town’ initiatives, where her work was displayed outside of the iconic St Paul’s Cathedral in London.

Deanna's design responds to the theme ‘Echoes in the Present’, which focuses on how the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and its related history has present day negative consequences: systemic inequalities and injustice; entrenched racism and prejudices; and the generational echoes which have traumatic physical, behavioural, psychological and material impact.

Toussaint Louverture, the subject of my globe, was truly inspirational. Toussaint fought to end slavery in Hispaniola and make men of all colours equal. He was the leader of the first and only successful uprising of Black enslaved people and was idolised by his many followers. 

Born into slavery in San-Domingue (present day Haiti) in 1743, he rose to become Governor General of Hispaniola. Through his intelligent leadership, personal charisma and absolute determination, and with his loyal band of ‘sans-culottes’ rebel soldiers, he outwitted the well-equipped armies of Spain, Britain and Napoleonic France; creating the first free independent state of Haiti. Toussaint was able to negotiate extremely favourable trade terms with America for San-Domingue because they felt so threatened by the rebellion, fearing the successful uprising might encourage similar events in its own enslaved populations. 

My globe tells the story of Haiti’s fight for freedom under Toussaint’s selfless leadership, and his generosity of spirit in contrast with the greed and acquisitiveness of those world powers who sought to profit from the triangular trade in people and commodities. With it, I hope to celebrate the remarkable achievements of this man and bring knowledge of him to a wider British audience. I have chosen to work in a flat graphic and silhouette style because Toussaint’s heroic acts of ‘derring do’ and legendary achievements remind me of comic strip superheroes. I have reflected the triangular trade in the quasi African wax cloth designs that pattern the continents. 

Atop the globe is an Adinkra symbol design based on ‘sankofa’, which teaches the wisdom of learning from the past in order to move forward.

My work is a fusion of painting and textile art, narrative and politics. I like to paint with stitch, draw with my sewing machine and weave my painted canvases with ethnically related textiles. Current affairs, people and politics are my inspiration. I work either in oils or acrylics on canvas or stitch and dyes on silks. The subject matter dictates the medium. My techniques are experimental and ever evolving. Line, movement and narrative content are important elements in my work that takes the form of kimono, wall hangings, soft sculptures and paintings.

www.deanna-tyson.com

Gherdai's design responds to the theme ‘Abolition & Emancipation’, which shares the story of the campaign for abolition, its key events, heroes and allies. It also lays bare the full, messy motivations and process of abolition, which were not as pure as often represented.

The ship ‘The Enterprise, en route from Alexandria, Virginia to Charleston, South Carolina, encountered a storm, and washed onto Bermuda's harbour with cargo of mainly mothers with suckling babies and children aged five or six. More than fifty of the enslaved people on the ship were children, most of whom had been kidnapped by raiders from their Washington and Maryland plantain homes. 

After emancipation in the British colonies, the price of enslaved people in the southern states of the US were at a premium. The children and mothers on board the ship, were to be re-sold into slavery in South Carolina. The ship’s captain was informed that slavery was already abolished in Bermuda, so in Bermuda waters the people would be considered free. The people were not listed in the ship’s manifest; it only included tobacco, bricks and feed. A legal battle ensued. 

The captain argued that the people were not Bermudian, they were American, and the ship was not intentionally in Bermudian waters since the boat was headed from a Northern US port to a southern one. A Bermudian organisation, The Colored Family Society heard about the ship, and advocated for their immediate release. All 78 persons on board the ship appeared in court and were permitted to decide for themselves if they wanted to remain in Bermuda or return to the ship. All chose freedom except one woman and her five children who chose to return to the US. 

This globe is in honour of the children of The Enterprise, who chose freedom for themselves and became Bermudian by way of the ocean.I construct and deconstruct identity, revealing layers of history and the complexities of post-colonial and Afro-Caribbean heritage. Currently my research work is investigating the onion and its relationship to Bermuda archives. I use the onion as a metaphor for identity. 

In Bermuda, the people are affectionately referred to themselves as ‘onions’, which dates back to the island’s production of onions during slavery. Black women were ‘minders’ of the onion seed, meaning the main caretakers of the cash crop that made Bermuda wealthy. I am using the layers of the onion in parallel with the layers of my Alibii figures, who represent the mothers on board The Enterprise.

Gherdai Hassell is a Bermudian born, China trained, multidisciplinary contemporary artist, writer and storyteller, based in Manchester, UK. Her work investigates memory and nostalgia to construct and deconstruct identity. She uses collage and painting to thread and weave histories, and tales of transformation passed down through family lineages. Her work typically centres female bodies, simultaneously existing within realms of past, present, and future. Her work is ultimately about migration, a gradual process of being and becoming the future. Her multimedia work reimagines relationships with the body as avatar, social space and the invisible world. Her artwork is a part of public and private collections across the world.

https://www.gherdaihassell.com

Phoebe Boswell’s design responds to the theme ‘Abolition & Emancipation’, which shares the story of the campaign for abolition, its key events, heroes and allies. It also lays bare the full, messy motivations and process of abolition, which were not as pure as often represented.

Emancipation, and yet we continue to exist in this constructed world – rooted in, tethered to, and reliant upon conditions of un-freedom. So we imagine new worlds; we imagine freedom. We cultivate methodologies, safety mechanisms, loving ecosystems, refusals, creativity, joy, in an attempt to live freely in the wake. But what is this? Are we singing, or are we screaming?

Phoebe Boswell’s figurative and interdisciplinary practice explores modalities of freedom, migration, contested histories and imagined futures through a black feminist and multilayered, diasporic lens, denoting a commitment of care for how we see ourselves and each other. Working intuitively across media, she centres drawing but spans animation, sound, video, writing, interactivity, performance and chorality to create layered, immersive installations which affect and are affected by the environments they occupy, by time, the serendipity of loops, and the presence of the audience. Boswell’s drawings, installations and film & video works have been exhibited widely internationally and are held in collections including the UK Government Art Collection, the BFI National Archive and The Studio Museum, New York.

www.phoebeboswell.com

Shivanee's design responds to the theme ‘A Complex Triangle’, which explores the complexity of Britain’s relationship with Africa, the Americas and the Caribbean across generations, and the legacy of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans on the UK’s role and reputation in the world.

Renowned poet Shivanee Ramlochan  responds to the theme ‘A Complex Triangle’, which explores the complexity of Britain’s relationship with Africa, the Americas and the Caribbean across generations, and the legacy of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans on the UK’s role and reputation in the world.

Shivanee Ramlochan is a Trinidadian writer. Her first book of poems, Everyone Knows I Am a Haunting (Peepal Tree Press, 2017) was a finalist for the People's Choice T&T Book of the Year, and was shortlisted for the 2018 Forward Prize for Best First Collection. “The Red Thread Cycle”, the central suite of seven poems from her debut collection, won a Small Axe Literary Competition Prize for Poetry (second-place), and was on audiovisual display at the National Art Gallery of the Bahamas. 

Shivanee has received residencies and fellowships from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Millay Arts, and Catapult Caribbean Arts Grant. She has served as a poetry reader and judge for Commonwealth Writers, Honeysuckle Press, Moko Magazine, Forward Prizes and others. 

A Spanish-language edition of Everyone Knows I Am a Haunting is to be published soon. Her second book, Unkillable, on Indo-Caribbean women’s disobedience, is forthcoming from Noemi Press in 2023. 

Kim's design responds to the theme ‘A Complex Triangle’, which explores the complexity of Britain’s relationship with Africa, the Americas and the Caribbean across generations, and the legacy of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans on the UK’s role and reputation in the world.

Windrush 1948 is a tribute to the British Caribbean community that came over to rebuild the UK after World War II. The piece seeks to take focus away from the ship itself and raise up the Caribbean community who, despite continuing to face racism and social injustice today, are a vital part of the fabric of the UK and its culture, more than worthy of acknowledgement and celebration.

Kim Thompson is a commercial illustrator and print artist based in Nottingham, UK. With recent clients including Columbia Records, Penguin Random House and Converse, Kim’s work is a visual love letter to nostalgia and kitsch, utilising storytelling, vivid colour and celebrating bold characters both real and imagined. Kim’s work often centres notions of sisterhood, Black joy and empowerment via otherness.

www.kimthompsonartist.com

Yinka’s design responds to the theme ‘A Complex Triangle’, which explores the complexity of Britain’s relationship with Africa, the Americas and the Caribbean across generations, and the legacy of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans on the UK’s role and reputation in the world.

The World Reimagined is a world map, reflecting historical trade routes and intercontinental power relations.

The Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans involved the transportation of enslaved African people by slave traders, mainly to the Americas. The trade regularly used a triangular route across the Atlantic and its Middle Passage and existed from the 16th to the 19th centuries.

A map that charts this triangular route, indicating the channels for the colonial trade in enslaved Africans, critically reflects the history that connects the African continent to the western world. However, by labelling the former trade routes with the names of African cultural practitioners and pioneers, historical and contemporary, it reverses the phenomenon of Western Enlightenment. African brilliance and intellectualism, formerly patronised and suppressed under colonial rule, is highlighted and celebrated. 

On the map, the colonial trade routes are complemented with contemporary migration routes, transferring the colonial history into present-day Africa. A continent that is thriving culturally and economically, and reinvents itself beyond its colonial past. 

On the map, the landmass is not divided into countries or states, denying the borders artificially created during the scramble for Africa. 

The World Reimagined celebrates a modern, united Africa, that is reclaiming its strong and stable roots and gains influence and power in a globalised world. 

Music: 

Dorothy Masuka, Emmanuel Jal, Hugh Masekela, Ali Farka Touré, Cesária Évora, Letta Mbulu, Oumou Sangaré, Thandi Klaasen, Fela Kuti, Titica

Science: 

Francisca Nneka Okeke, Gebisa Ejeta, Kelvin Doe, Oyèrónkẹ́ Oyèwùmí, Kitaw Ejigu, 

Literature:

Flora Nwapa, Florence Onyebuchi Emecheta, Cyprian Ekwensi, Dambudzo Marechera , Omolara Ogundipe, Clémentine Faik Nzuji

Art: 

El Anatsui, Emo de Medeiros, Kudzanai-Violet Hwami, George Osodi, Okwui Enwezor, Ghada Amer, Ibrahim El-Salahi, Lakin Ogunbanwo, Rotimi Fani-Kayode

Film: 

Edi Gathegi, Florence Kasumba, John Kani, Kemi Adetiba, Dani Kouyaté, Mahamat-Saleh Haroun, Ousmane Sembène

Entertainment:

Eddie Kadi, Trevor Noah

Philosophy: 

Henry Odera Oruka, Achille Mbembe, V. Y. Mudimbe, Sophie Oluwole

Yinka Shonibare CBE RA (b. 1962) in London, UK, studied Fine Art at Byam Shaw School of Art, London (1989) and received his MFA from Goldsmiths, University of London (1991).

His interdisciplinary practice uses citations of Western art history and literature to question the validity of contemporary cultural and national identities within the context of globalization. Through examining race, class and the construction of cultural identity, his works comment on the tangled interrelationship between Africa and Europe, and their respective economic and political histories.

In 2004, he  was nominated for the Turner Prize and in 2008, his mid-career survey began at Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, travelling in 2009 to the Brooklyn Museum, New York and the Museum of African Art at the Smithsonian Institute, Washington D.C. In 2010, his first public art commission ‘Nelson’s Ship in a Bottle’ was displayed on the Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square, London and is in the permanent collection of the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

In 2013, he was elected a Royal Academician and was awarded the honour of ‘Commander of the Order of the British Empire’ in 2019. His installation ‘The British Library’ was acquired by Tate in 2019 and is currently on display at Tate Modern, London.

Shonibare was awarded the prestigious Whitechapel Gallery Art Icon Award last year. A major retrospective of his work opened at the Museum der Moderne, Salzburg in May 2021 followed by his co-ordination of The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, London which opened in September 2021.

Shonibare’s works are in notable museum collections internationally, including the Tate Collection, London; Victoria and Albert Museum, London; National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institute, Washington, D.C; Museum of Modern Art, New York; Moderna Museet, Stockholm; the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; National Gallery of Modern Art in Rome and VandenBroek Foundation, The Netherlands. 

www.yinkashonibare.com

Gabriel's design responds to the theme ‘Echoes in the Present’, which focuses on how the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and its related history has present day negative consequences: systemic inequalities and injustice; entrenched racism and prejudices; and the generational echoes which have traumatic physical, behavioural, psychological and material impact.

In this painting I reference the Brookes diagram which showed how enslaved Africans were positioned on ships from West Africa to the Americas and Caribbean.

People were positioned in a cramped order, way over safe capacities, and head to head. I decided to depict two children who are head to head and holding hands. They are trying to comfort each other in this frightening experience of transatlantic travel.  

I'm interested in how this relates to the African diaspora in Britain today. I imagine Echoes in the Present to be the divisive nature of colonial borders which continue to be promoted amongst Black people.

However, in resistance, we are united – like the two children in my piece. We can choose to hold onto each other and be one others' support as we move towards racial justice together.

Gabriel’s artwork combines the twin disciplines of printmaking and painting, primarily in oil on paper. Through his singular technique, Choto seeks new pathways into the painted image by taking cues from the surface quality produced by the printmaking process.

His evolving, experimental practice involves layering painted areas of naturalism over the delicate compositional architecture of etching, resulting in paintings where physical presence and absence imply a metaphoric liminal state. 

Sensitive and intimate, these images include close family members, depicting quiet moments of contemplation or affectionate domestic scenes taken from old photographs, progressing into self portraits where through constructed situations the artist examines his own identity.

Choto’s intimate paintings draw on themes of home, pride, identity and diaspora.

The work of making racial justice a reality must be rooted in community – in our individual and collective experiences, hopes and contributions. Koby’s design was created in response to dialogue and workshops with local communities.

Koby’s process of creating the idea for the globe involved it being partitioned in two parts —the first being the painting illustrated with the blue banner ‘Justice 4 The Pryces’ which goes on to portray on both corners of the notice, the Ghanaian Adinkra symbol ‘Funtunfunefu Denkyemfuntunefu’ that translates as Siamese crocodiles in English. The symbol represents democracy and unity which serves as a reminder that infighting and tribalism is harmful to all who engage in it.

The piece comes together to pay particular attention to the case of Eustace Pryce, who was murdered in a racist attack in 1984. Shortly afterwards Pryce’s brother Gerald was arrested. The murderer, Martin Newhouse, was also eventually arrested, but the judicial proceedings clearly revealed the bias of the police and of the wider justice system: the murderer was released on bail over Christmas whereas Gerald Pryce, whose brother had died and was dubiously charged with affray, was denied bail. The NMP (Newham Monitoring Project) established in the 1980’s, organised a defence campaign where their work was crucial in contesting Gerald Pryce’s criminalisation, as well as highlighting the institutional racism of the police and legal system. 

On the other side of the globe is a depiction of the London riots which occurred almost ten years ago. They spread across London, including in Newham, as well as other major English cities. It was sparked by the death of 29 year old Mark Duggan, who was shot dead by police in Tottenham on 4 August 2011. The riots – the biggest in modern English history – lasted for five days and swept the capital, from Wood Green to Woolwich. The reverberations of these historical events juxtaposed against each other in the context of the present are striking; questioning what has actually changed within the legal system and the institutional racism of the police force. 

This globe piece is as much concerned with the present — and the future — as with the past. In a cinematic style of flames which is distinctively his, Koby uses fire as a symbol of cleansing and purification against the structures of institutional racism of the police and legal system; burning down the edifices that have been a significant legatee of these horrendous acts over the years. 

Koby’s intention painting was also to bring to life the historical narratives of the inspirational work by community activists as well as individuals like George Eustace and others whose stories and images are largely forgotten by historical accounts, and also to create a dialogue between the past and the present: disturbing parallels with racist violence then and now.

Koby Martin is a Ghanaian born British based Artist. Koby Martin is a proud export of Ghana. His talent and God-given gift was nurtured in his motherland and polished in the United Kingdom. These worlds merge together in his art where traits his African descent and life in Europe thus far, can be seen as a consistent influence in the narratives of his pieces. Koby’s work is an introspective autobiographical exploration of his life which portrays the inclusive human experience of dealing with emotions, memories, thoughts and feelings that we all undeniably feel. Through emotive figures, subjects and abstract forms, he captures beautifully the human essence of both courage and sadness which is a constant theme throughout his work that is expressed in both traditional and digital mediums. Throughout his career, Koby has been responsible for various creative content for global level for artists including Krept & Konan, Wizkid, J Hus, Wretch 32, Chronixx, Tinie Tempah and many more.

www.Kobmart.co.uk

Joshua's design responds to the theme ‘Echoes in the Present’, which focuses on how the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and its related history has present day negative consequences: systemic inequalities and injustice; entrenched racism and prejudices; and the generational echoes which have traumatic physical, behavioural, psychological and material impact.

This globe design is based around a body of work called Ancestral Foundations. This project looked to explore the impact that African ancestry plays on our sense of identity, especially for those who have grown up in Western countries with histories of colonialism and racial prejudice. 

This work was exhibited as a series of audio conversations accompanied by dual portraits intended as a means of gaining a truer reflection of each individual and the backgrounds that have influenced their lives. Every figure in this globe design has some connection with Wales, whether they have grown up around Wales or have moved in later life. 

By scanning the QR codes you can hear the sitters share a range of experiences; from those who have a strong connection to their roots to those whose connection has been broken or is unknown as a result of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans. Many recall their personal experiences of connecting and reconnecting to their ancestry and their experiences of growing up and living in Wales. 

Surrounding each portrait on the globe are photos from the archives and family albums of those I spoke with. Hence each figure is submerged in their personal memories and family histories.

Joshua describes his practice as visual narration. He aims to tell a story through his work and bring the audience into a different experience, whether through portraiture, landscape painting or installation. Through the work he hopes to convey different emotions and sensations and create an open platform for personal exploration and discussion. His current work focuses on challenging perceptions of racial and cultural identity. Issues of racism and stereotyping have permeated Western art and remain present in contemporary media and society. Growing up in in England has given Joshua a Western perspective /training in art and painting, yet his practice has also been significantly informed by Ghanaian culture alongside black artists and voices.

www.joshuadonkorart.co.uk

Curtis’s design responds to the theme ‘Echoes in the Present’, which focuses on how the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and its related history has present day negative consequences: systemic inequalities and injustice; entrenched racism and prejudices; and the generational echoes which have traumatic physical, behavioural, psychological and material impact.

Echoes Talk Back is an evolution of my current series of large multilayered coloured pencil portraits titled ‘The Talk’ in which I distil complex conversations with my sitters about our shared experiences as Black men in today’s society. 

The globe features portraits of Black men from different generations. The men are in conversation with each other and themselves. Each portrait shows the passage and echoes of time with the overlay of fractured lines. The changing body language and expression of each sitter captures their response to our intimate exchange. How do we as Black men fit into this society we call home? How do we reconcile the idea of a home as a safe haven with the reality of a system that systematically fails us and our families? How do we begin healing from the trauma and chaos these febrile, wayward pencil lines represent? 

A starting point is the unity and connection that is possible through the dialogue we have with ourselves, each other and the wider community represented here by the infinity of the sphere.

Drawing inspiration from intimate conversations with his subjects, Curtis Holder (b. 1968) explores the complexities of human emotions and how we connect with and interpret the feelings of each other through sensitive artistic expression.

Holder’s large-scale, multi-layered coloured pencil portraits are dynamically tender, revealing something of the inner life of his sitters. He aims to evoke an individual’s unspoken truth, which he compels the viewer to search for, and in doing so, reflect upon their own perceptions.

Holder’s portraits emerge in dynamic, complex strokes, capturing a sense of his subjects’ form, movement and emotional intent. Preliminary pencil marks remain as part of his energetic process of capturing fleeting gestures and emotions with sensitivity and a raw honesty. Stronger, spontaneous lines are used to anchor the subject in a final, bold depiction.

In 2020 Holder won Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year. His winner’s commission, a portrait of world-renowned ballet dancer, Carlos Acosta, is now part of the permanent collection at the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, UK.

Instagram: @curtisartist

www.curtisholder.co.uk

Larry's design responds to the theme ‘Echoes in the Present’, which focuses on how the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and its related history has present day negative consequences: systemic inequalities and injustice; entrenched racism and prejudices; and the generational echoes which have traumatic physical, behavioural, psychological and material impact.

The fight for freedom, equality and justice is the longest, most demanding, draining and dangerous of global wars to have ever been fought, and yet again, the most necessary battle for Black peoples. We can only afford to advance (for we have a lot at stake) and therefore to retreat or surrender is out of the question, for there is a cause! Sometimes, due to the brutal injustices we continue to experience as a people, we tend to forget or undermine the tremendous progress we have achieved as a minority group subjected to centuries of suppression. 

Hold The Line is a work made to remind every descendant of the enslaved, the suppressed, the colonised and our allies of the deadly battles we have fought in this war, how long it has taken for us to get here – and the need to defend what we have attained so far. It also clarifies our responsibility to push for the best for the following generations by uniting more than ever today, in order to pave more ways for further progress. It also encourages openness, peace and love; keeping our hope for a utopian future alive. 

A future in which difference is considered the key ingredient which holds and strengthens us together, rather than a tool for division. There’s no going back – we must take our place and own the space. We must tilt the ground and build things up. For out of the knowledge of holding a stake in a country, hope emerges. And with hope, we can build a better future that is diverse and inclusive, fair and just for everyone. 

I believe the fight for racial harmony and equality is the one fight every person alive today must be concerned with, as we will truly do well as a people when every one of us does well. Therefore let’s not stop hoping for that utopian world we imagined from the start – our lives depend on it and no matter what happens we must always remember to hold the line!

Larry Amponsah (b. 1989, Accra-Ghana) is a multimedia artist whose practice investigates traditional modes of image-making whilst employing unconventional strategies of production to look at the contemporary politics of imagery. Through the language of painting, Amponsah creates collages made of archival images, objects, and stories from various cultures in order to negotiate systems of power and create new ways of transcending boundaries.

Amponsah transforms, prints and cuts into archival images, which he assembles in collages that are further worked upon using mechanical processes and his honed skills as a trained painter. In this succession of strategic moves about image-making techniques, dynamic compositions emerge, as well as compelling narratives or portraits that reference his own African upbringing within a greater global narrative.

Larry Amponsah is an Associate Lecturer at the Camberwell College of Art - UAL and received his MA in Painting from the Royal College of Art, London (2018) after studying at Jiangsu University China (2016) and at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Kumasi in Ghana (2015). Larry was a Trustee of The Kuenyehia Art Trust in Ghana, got shortlisted for the 2019 Dentons Art Prize and won the Be Smart About Art Award in 2019.

Recent solo exhibitions include: ‘Genesis, The Plan & The Promise’, The Breeder Gallery, Athens (2022); ‘When A Stone Cracks, We Don’t Stitch’, 50 Golborne, London (2019); ‘The Open City of Many Gods’ Billboard, Bloc Projects, Sheffield (2019) and ‘Imaginary Direction of Time’, The Fine Art Gallery, CSU-Pueblo Hoag Hall, Colorado (2018). 

Recent group exhibitions include: ‘DEAR’, Dyson Gallery, RCA Battersea, London (2019); ‘DAMNED IF I DO... DAMNED IF I DON’T’ for Open Space: Of Hosts & Guests, Pushkin House, London (2019); ‘FBA Futures Exhibition’, Mall Galleries, London (2019); ‘SURGE’, East Wing Biennial 13, Courtauld Institute of Art, London (2018); ‘YOUNG GUNS’, Sulger-Buel Lovell Gallery, London (2018); ‘Open House CCA’, Delfina Foundation, London (2017); ‘What is your local word for 'Smile'?’, ArtXanady's Pop-up Gallery, Labone, Ghana (2016); and ‘The Gown Must Go To Town’, Museum of Science and Technology, Accra (2015), amongst others.

https://thebreedersystem.com/activity/larry-amponsah_genesis-the-plan-the-promise/

Nicola's design responds to the theme ‘Abolition & Emancipation’, which shares the story of the campaign for abolition, its key events, heroes and allies. It also lays bare the full, messy motivations and process of abolition, which were not as pure as often represented.

I was inspired by the story of the Palenque people from San Basilio de Palenque, a small town in Colombia. 

I was reading Emma Dabiri’s ‘Don’t Touch My Hair’, and was struck by the power of the story of how hair was used as a tool to help the enslaved find the free land that was founded by Benkos Bioho. Plaiting and braiding was used as part of an ingenious way to map the location of Palenque; the enslaved couldn’t risk writing the information down, so they hid it in plain sight. The plantation owners had no idea that the hairstyles were a form of communication which eventually led to their freedom. They would escape in groups of four and would put grains of rice in their hair so that once they arrived they could plant their own crops. 

I tried to include these elements into my design, which represents a birds eye view of the four heads of enslaved people joined together and forming a map. The partings are the roads and there are rice grains tucked into the image just as it would have been tucked into their hair. The black background represents the night, as I imagine that would have been when they chose to escape. 

The contrast between black and white also represents the state of the world at the time – a metaphor for the extreme racial division. The globe is designed so that wherever you stand you will see four heads joined to form a map, like a compass rose, allowing the people to find their own way to freedom.

Nicola is a multidisciplinary London-based artist, she graduated from Central St Martins in 2021 with a degree in Jewellery Design and is currently studying a Master's Degree in Art & Science. Her practice focuses on using human hair as a storytelling tool to challenge the intricate and complex relationship between race and identity we encounter in our daily lives. 

She has developed an innovative method of transforming human hair into a sustainable material that can be laser cut, producing contemporary pieces of jewellery inspired by the beauty and versatility of black hair. Her work has been exhibited during Munich Jewellery week and is owned by private collectors, Central St Martins Museum & study collection including their Materials library.

In September 2022, she will begin a residency with Favelab in Athens on a collaborative art project launching in 2023. 

https://showcase.arts.ac.uk/project/210782/cover

The work of making racial justice a reality must be rooted in community – in our individual and collective experiences, hopes and contributions. Shannon's design was created in response to dialogue and workshops with local communities.

My paintings embody an afro-fem-centrist consciousness, sharing muted narratives and projecting Black women’s lived experience. I am invested in producing layered, figurative, compositions embedded with symbols and scientific metaphors that centralise Black womanhood as a source of knowledge and understanding. 

Enamoured by African spirituality, Christian iconography and renaissance art, I employ its purpose of cultural impact, liturgy and instruction for an improved society within my works. I explore the internal body as well as the external, by merging the design of notable fabrics from Africa with biological structures and chemical processes in living organisms for the backgrounds of my works and using the anatomy as a second canvas in the foreground. 

My globe design presents the faces of the women of Westminster Amy Ashwood Garvey and Mary Seacole, both women have plaques in the community but I feel it is important we represent them and put faces to their names. These women led lives dedicated to the service of others and have impacted history with their work.

Shannon Bono is a multimedia-driven artist, curator, cultural writer, and MA Art & Science graduate from Central Saint Martins University 2019. Bono is invested in producing symbolic layered figurative compositions that centralise the black female body as the subject, using it as a second canvas to tell stories of intersectionality and cultural practices with oil and acrylic paints as her medium. 

Her mission to advocate for the presence of black bodies is captured by the element of scale, colour, and anatomical manipulation. She re-imagines these bodies as a map of modernity employing surrealist cues to work as ‘artivisms’ (art+activism) against oppressive forces and share muted narratives.

www.bono-art.com

Glory's design responds to the theme ‘Still We Rise’, which recognises and honours the enslaved and their descendants who resisted, who succeeded, and who broke new ground. We honour the well-known and celebrated, and shed light on untold legacies and events.

Dear Archives is a globe installation which gathers my mental montage on unpopular but renown historical figures. Growing up, I vividly remember Roots, Twelve Years A Slave and The Color Purple being audacious portrayals of the horrors of African slavery or racial injustice. It felt like either we don’t go far back enough, or we don’t see history holistically. 

Still We Rise is a theme that honours victors, not victims. By this, I mean African, Black westerners who were met with prejudice and used the opportunity to overcome, and not remain victims, by being proactive not reactive.

James Forten innovated the original sail, owning a sail loft business worth millions circa 1800. He was friends with Paul Cuffee, a sea captain who built the first racially integrated school in Massachusetts.

Septimius Severus, an African Roman Emperor came to Britain in the second century to strengthen Hadrian’s wall.

Black Aristocratic Art is a blog I created to honour the side of art history which is often overlooked, or simply unknown. It is important for Black communities in the West to acknowledge African individuals who pioneered in their spheres of influence.

As a figurative painter, Afro-Caribbean and British citizen at birth, I assess ethnic minority identities in the western world by creating iconic narratives through my portraiture.

Living in London has taught me to use ethnic isolation as a platform of distinction rather than a victim collective, and to understand other artists who have felt non-British because of their ethnicity. Painting is the bridge that transforms my thoughts into visual action against misrepresentation. Each painting has a voice of its own; they ask questions that must be answered.

Art history is a critical subject for me, because not long ago I realised that ethnic minority artists find themselves underrepresented in historical portraiture. Before a painting of mine reaches its finished form, it requires investigation into my model, and their stance in society. 

The women I paint are artists, business owners and intellectuals sharing their stories by inserting themselves into the narrative of European art history. I want Europe’s diverse history to create a harmony between ethnic minorities and majorities in the gallery space, with the common denominator of healthy nationalism.

Vashti's design responds to the theme ‘Still We Rise’, which recognises and honours the enslaved and their descendants who resisted, who succeeded, and who broke new ground. We honour the well-known and the celebrated, and shed light on untold legacies and events.

“We build our temples for tomorrow, strong as we know how, and we stand on top of the mountain, free within ourselves.” In this his essay The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain, American writer and poet Langston Hughes makes the case for the celebrating blackness. 

He describes “the mountain” as the pressure to assimilate into white culture and American standardization as something we must overcome to fully be free. His final line evokes a hopefulness for his fellow artists but it rings true for all of us.

During the Harlem Renaissance many American writers, thinkers, and artists actively sought out the ancestry from which they had been severed as a result of the transatlantic slave trade, the histories that had been erased, the artistry that had been lost. The theme “and still we rise” recognizes those who resisted, rose above and succeeded. Many of the artists of this period fit that category as the act of being an artist itself is an act of resistance - especially considering the times marked by Jim Crow, World War, Great Migration and Great Depression. Still though we can look to the art, the motifs and the themes for hope. Hope for ourselves and hope for our future. 

I look to these artists for guidance to envision a world where young people can rise. On the globe we can see a futuristic city on the horizon, from the distance children walk, run and play, returning to an ancestral land. At the top they gaze at the stars, free. Sprinkled throughout are references to those who rose, Aaron Douglas, Augusta Savage, Langston Hughes, and a sankofa bird reminding us we take from the past what is good and bring it into the present to make a better future. together.

Vashti Harrison is a #1 New York Times-bestselling author-illustrator of children’s books. She has a background in filmmaking and a love for storytelling. She is the author and illustrator of the best-selling middle grade books Little Leaders, Little Dreamers, Little Legends, and the illustrator of the best-selling picture books Hair Love by Matthew Cherry and Sulwe by Lupita Nyong’o, which received a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor. Vashti is also a two-time recipient of the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work for Children. Originally from Onley, Virginia, she now lives in Brooklyn, NY.

www.vashtiharrison.com

Carol's design responds to the theme ‘Expanding Soul’, which celebrates the spirit and culture of the African diaspora that, even in the face of incredible suffering, has endured and found vibrant expression across the world in music, art, food and so much more.

In many African and indigenous cultures the ‘soul’ considers the life force or spirit needed to communicate with higher powers and nature. This piece explores our connection to the natural environment, water and earth being conduits which support both human and plant growth. The artist plays with dark and light, highs and lows, bringing to light narratives of migration, botanical exchange, African and indigenous knowledge. Popular narratives often omit the fact that enslaved Africans brought considerable knowledge of plants and their uses in spiritual, agricultural and healing traditions. Plants crossed the waters sometimes alongside African bodies with more care and attention given to protect the fragile root systems of the plants, than to the human roots which were severed. The artist’s drawings are taken from plants in her own garden and family gardens in Dominica.

Sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum) – Economics
A large grass plant from which sugar, molasses and rum are processed. Sugarcane is the economic crop most commonly associated with the brutal system of chattel slavery, which uprooted Africans from home and culture.

Pineapple (Ananas comosus) – Colonial Showpiece
Pineapples were an important crop to indigenous people of the Americas and used as medicine, food, fibre and form of welcome. The plants became a symbol of colonialism and status, grown in specially heated ‘pineries’ and glass houses across Europe. They became embedded into culture as a design feature in British architecture, gardens, art, tableware and home decorations. 

Wa Wa (Ranjania cordata) – Resistance
A wild yam indigenous to the island of Dominica and a survival food for Maroons who escaped enslavement on the plantations. Yams are spiritually and nutritionally important in many African cultures and some varieties were introduced from Africa to the Caribbean.

Ferns – Unfolding Futures
The Ghanaian Adinkra symbol ‘AYA’ represents endurance and unfolding futures. Ferns were collected by colonial explorers and grown in Victorian hothouses and ferneries and a sign of wealth and status.

Vanilla (Vanilla planifolia) – Wisdom
An edible orchid found in the forests of central and South America with a long history of use by indigenous cultures. The method of hand pollination with a blade of grass was discovered by a 12 year old enslaved African boy called Edmond Albius (1829 – 1880) on a plantation in Reunion Island. This artificial method of pollination led to the rise of the commercial propagation of vanilla, a well loved Victorian flavouring.

Peacock Flower (Caesalpinia pulcherrima) – Freedom of Spirit
The seeds and leaves of this beautiful plant were used as an abortificient by enslaved African women who wished to spare their unborn child the horrors of the brutal slavery system.

African Rice (Oryza glaberrima ) –  Survival 
Africans contributed to agricultural knowledge and dry planting methods of this hardy, nutritious rice crop. Rice grains and small seeds were also plaited into the hair and transplanted into new lands as a survival strategy.

Cannabis (Cannabis sativa) – Health and Healing
Cannabis has a long history as a healing and psychoactive herb. It was used by indigenous cultures in Africa and India, by enslaved Africans on plantations to cope with oppressive conditions and by Maroons. Cannabis is used as a spiritual herb in the Rastafarian community and as a tea and rub for joint pains by elders in the Caribbean. Politically important due to the imprisonment and incarceration of millions of people across the globe, especially young Black men. Some varieties are a good source of fibre, used for rope, textiles and sails.

Cotton (Gossypium barbadense) – Memory
Cotton is an important economic crop entangled in the traumatic textile history of the world. Textiles such as calico and muslin were often traded as commodities for enslaved Africans. Plantations in the Caribbean and America relied on the labour of enslaved Africans for the arduous task of planting and picking cotton which helped fuel the rise of industrial Britain. This species grown in the Caribbean is called Sea Island cotton, and is known for its long silken fibres.

Cocoa (Theobroma cacao) – Indiginous Cultures  
Cocoa has a long history of use going back to the Aztecs who believed it to be ‘food of the Gods’ and used it as a drink for health and vitality. In the late seventeenth century Sir Hans Sloane, a British physician and naturalist, learnt the method of mixing chocolate with milk from enslaved Africans in Jamaica and introduced this to Britain on his return along with 800 new species of plants. Cocoa was also an economic crop which relied on the forced labour of enslaved Africans on plantations.

Arrowroot (Maranta arundinacea) – Embodied Knowledge 
This is an important economic plant with Amerindian origins and a history of the root being used as an antidote for poison arrows and insect bites.  Arrowroot became very popular in Victorian times and was used by colonial doctors in tropical medicine in plantation hospitals as an easily digestible starch for nourishing babies and the sick. This starch is still used as a porridge and thickener in the Caribbean and by Caribbean elders living in Britain.

Carol is a Dominican artist whose work explores connection to landscape, place and the entangled nature of botanical history and related cultural heritage. Carol has a diverse portfolio career which began as an Interior, Exhibition and Spatial Designer. She designed promotional stands and backdrops for countries represented at travel and tourism shows such as World Travel Market Olympia and Earl’s Court, London.

http://www.carolsorhaindoartist.com/

Alvin's design responds to the theme ‘A Complex Triangle’, which explores the complexity of Britain’s relationship with Africa, the Americas and the Caribbean across generations, and the legacy of the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans on the UK’s role and reputation in the world.

The complex triangular movement of material goods and enslaved labour between Europe, Africa and the Americas enriched colonial empires. The ghost of that movement exists today, echoing the same economic manipulation of resources. Throughout this movement of resources from the southern to the northern hemisphere, cultures have been dismantled and destroyed; their ritualised customs denied and demonised. And their most sacred artefacts that embodied cultural identity have been removed as booty, and through other unjust means. 

This idea is narrated through colour, symbols and historical icons which comprise the content of the globe entitled The Longitude Of Culture. 

Gold dominates the colour palette, signifying our precious planet and the gold that motivated Europeans to explore Africa in their thirst for riches and knowledge. Within the traditional cultures of Africa, symbols and motifs have always been used to document the changing historical narrative. Pulling from those traditions I have created my globe. 

Overlapping symbols, colours and shapes help convey the complex timeline linking the past to the present. Born out of the idea of the Adinkra symbol, ‘Mpatapo’ depicts the knot with no beginning or end – representing peace after conflict, emulating that unbroken line of connection. The recognisable slave ship, the gun, the lion, the plane, the Black Star to Garvey, the aised fist synonymous with the Black power movement and now Black Lives Matter, all have become icons of resistance against white supremacy. 

With the call for the return of many cultures’ most precious artefacts, it is only right that African spiritual belief systems be recognised and acknowledged as justified frameworks through which we see the world and its history. The flow of knowledge from those indigenous cultures along the lines of longitude into Western culture has, and can, add to the discussions of our future world. 

COLOUR CODE:

Gold: Richness of our cultural inheritance and the main colour of the globe, representing the wealth along the Gold Coast – wealth that brought economic stability to those foreign cultures, but also drove the greed of Europeans and destruction of Africa’s cultures. 

White: Closely associated with sugar, that sweetness which compelled Europeans, and committed hundreds of thousands to a life of enslaved labour to satisfy the taste buds of so few. Whiteness also fuels the concept of superiority and imposition of colonialists' religion on their subjects. 

Grey: The colour of iron from Europe used to trade with Africa. A material that became the main contributor to wars through the development of arms creating a devastating advantage in the Transatlantic Trade in Enslaved Africans and its use to dominate Africa. 

Copper: A natural material found in Africa played a major role in assisting the process of enslavement. Copper sheeting used on hulls reduced the weight of the ships transporting the enslaved human cargo, shortening the journey time across the Atlantic and reducing the number of slaves that died, improving the efficiency of this brutal economy.

Although a second-generation West Indian who grew up in London, Alvin Kofi’s creative perspective is very much African-centred and he seeks to explore, learn and celebrate the traditional notions of African culture. From his formative years he has studied and practised African cosmology and this is evident in his work. 

Kofi studied graphic design at art school, but his preferred choice of expression is painting, and his preferred use of narrative, the human form. His figurative paintings re-examine universal themes through the Black figure drawing from ancient mythological stories that still have relevance today. Exploring these theme’s he plays with the representation of ideas which we hold on to layered with motifs and symbols that allow us to interrogate what we believe. 

Kofi is a multi-disciplined artist working in mediums across the public and private sector producing installations to sculptures but concentrates his practice around the expression of painting. Whichever medium he is using, his approach is to get back to materials that are authentic and organic to the conversation or question being had in the process. 

Alvin was a finalist in the Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year Award 2020, and he is one of the Highly Commended artists participating in the Ruth Borchard Self-Portrait Prize 2021 online exhibition of long-listed artists.

www.alvinkofi.com

Emmanuel's design responds to the theme ‘Expanding Soul’, which celebrates the spirit and culture of the African diaspora that, even in the face of incredible suffering, has endured and found vibrant expression across the world in music, art, food and so much more.

Parallel Empires, Ancestral Kingdoms presents the notion that mythological energy of African ancestral nobility appears to manifest in contemporary culture; avenues such as music, fashion, sport, academia, carnival and more.

Speaking to the heart and soul of nations, these successful individuals come as one, but stand as ten thousand; expanding the mind through their respective mediums and celebrating the visible integration of cultural exchange into a globalised world. 

Fragmented faces signify fragments of known history collaged with multimedia hand-drawn and painted layers to interpret their subjects' emotion and metaphysical reflection. An inverse ode to cubism highlighting a silent conversation between European masters and African sculptural aesthetics.

Rhythm and blues breathes in lines and colours; purples and blue symbolise the bruises of the past that are not visible on black skin. Illustrative leaf motifs inspired by Ankara fabric patterns and red leaves reference African griot storytelling traditions through sound. 

This design pays homage to the synergy of griot storytellers, specifically African American singers; Billie Holiday’s Strange Fruit, Nina Simone, and Kanye West’s Blood on the Leaves.

Emmanuel Unaji was born in 1994 in London. He studied fashion design and completed a degree in Fine Art at Kingston School of Art, London in 2020. Dubbed by British GQ as the Nigerian Artist reinterpreting fashion illustration, Unaji’s a polymath who’s multidisciplinary practice is a wide spectrum, spanning fine and commercial artforms freely combining painting, drawing, collage and product design with adept experience in High Fashion, modelling for Brands such as Gucci, British GQ, Adidas amongst others. Emmanuel has carved out his own space, at the junction of luxury, performance and fine art, where he mechanically deconstructs select images and identities that the media offer up to us. Emmanuel is interested in engaging the viewer in a conversation, by exploring what lies beneath the surface of content that we consume. The essence of Emmanuel’s art practice navigates the socioeconomic dichotomy of creativity and business, investigating the intersection of autonomy and public persona, self and celebrity.

https://www.emmanuelunaji.com/

Neequaye's design responds to the theme ‘Expanding Soul’, which celebrates the spirit and culture of the African diaspora that, even in the face of incredible suffering, has endured and found vibrant expression across the world in music, art, food and so much more.

My globe design is a celebration of the style and dress of Black people in Britain over the last half century; since the Windrush Generation, one of the first large groups of post-war Caribbean migrants to the UK in the 1950s. It is a visual snapshot depicting six cultural turning points over this period; Calypso, Reggae, Hip Hop, Dancehall, Jungle and Grime. These musical genres and their respective dress codes reflected the social and political ideals of the day. 

A broad range of expression included our desire to be seen in a hostile environment, Black consciousness or symbols of wealth and status. Despite not always receiving the reverence it deserved and dismissed in recent times as materialistic or frivolous, Black British music and style continues to permeate mainstream British culture at the highest levels. Personal style is a reflection of lifestyle. 

Our style is a nuanced expression of identity that draws from the melting pot of rich British and diasporic influences. As our styles continue to evolve, what is constant is our desire to express pride, strength and a commitment to making something out of nothing.

Dreph is a visual artist working across a wide range of media. With a focus on portraiture and painting the human figure, Dreph’s subjects are everyday people, friends, family or those he meets whilst painting in the streets. With exploration of colour and an attention to sartorial detail, he uses his work to tell his subjects stories. He is inspired as much by 80s British sci-fi comics and New York subway art as he is the old masters. Dreph is passionate about the cultural and creative exchange that can be shared whilst travelling and this has profoundly informed his practice. After 3 decades of street based painting, Dreph’s work can be found in Asia, Africa, the UAE, Central, South and North America and throughout Europe. Dreph is an Illustration lecturer at Portsmouth University.

www.dreph.co.uk

Please note this Globe will join the others on the Town Hall steps on the 10 November 2022.

Jess's design responds to the theme ‘Reimagine the Future’, which gives us free rein to imagine the society we can create when we have a full understanding of our shared history; the place the UK can hold in the world when it acknowledges its past; and who we can be as people and a country when we give full dignity to all.

A Code For A Better Future draws heavily on what every community can do to create a better world for tomorrow. 

Using the Adinkra symbols that originated in Ghana, West Africa – which have been used for creating fabrics, logos and pottery for many centuries – this design creates a code for how we as humans need to behave to imagine a world that is equal for all.

Identifying four core categories seen throughout the Adinkra symbols – education, co-operation, love and peace – the pattern that has been created on the sculpture resembles a code. Using symbols such as ‘Sankofa’ meaning ‘learn from the past,’ as well as ‘Bi Nka Bi’ which symbolises peace and harmony, this pattern asks the world to educate themselves on the past, and work together to find a better future. 

The colours and layout for this design are inspired by the lost wax pouring techniques of Benin. The symbols are arranged as though being poured from the top as well as rising up from underneath; as though molten gold being poured through a mould. 

I used a vinyl stencil technique to create the design. This involved spraying the whole globe gold and, once dry, attaching the vinyl stencils to the sculpture. I then sprayed the whole sculpture black, and peeled the stencils off to reveal the gold symbols underneath. 

This method provides an extremely clean and precise finish, and creates a very smooth surface. The overall aesthetic of the sculpture is intended to be elegant and simple, but with a very important message.

Jess Perrin is an illustrator and designer, living and working in Birmingham. Jess studied Graphic Communication and Illustration at Loughborough University, specializing in animation and character design. She completed her Master’s Degree in Visual Communication in 2019, and loves to create graphic digital work with a strong narrative.

Her love for design of all types can be seen throughout her work, particularly playing with colour to portray meaning and evoke emotion. Throughout her professional life, Jess has found a love of pattern design, and is particularly influenced by folk art from around the world as well as drawing inspiration from the natural world and the stories people have to tell.

Jess has created over 40 sculptures with Wild in Art since 2017 for a number of trails across the UK, raising over £120,000 from the sale of her work for various charities.

Find Jess on Instagram

Ali's design responds to the theme ‘Reimagine the Future’, which gives us free rein to imagine the society we can create when we have a full understanding of our shared history; the place the UK can hold in the world when it acknowledges its past; and who we can be as people and a country when we give full dignity to all.

Represented through the art of quilting, this design celebrates the vividly complex stories of pain, oppression, freedom, and power of African American culture.

Originally African textiles were made by men, the slave division of work according to Western patriarchal practices in the United States meant women took over the tradition. A combination of traditional African appliqué techniques mixed with traditional European quilting styles brought African American quilts to life. These quilts tell stories, documenting family trees, remembering departed loved ones, and sharing faith. Using discarded scraps from cloth, quilts were made from gunny sacks to old blankets and worn clothes. The use of symbols, bright colours, vertical pieces, enlarged graphic designs, and asymmetry originated from African textile styles. 

A break in a pattern symbolised rebirth in ancestral power with a break in a pattern helped keep spirits away. Evil was believed to travel in straight lines and this break confused the spirits and slowed them down. Many of the incorporated symbols remain unknown. 

Stories exist about the role quilts may have had in the Underground Railroad, although researchers have found little actual evidence of codes in the quilt blocks or messages in quilts hanging on clothes-lines. Fact or myth, the idea of a quilt code is compelling: instead of a pen and paper, the quilts use a needle and scraps of fabric to provide a unique history of lives and culture. Stitch by stitch, bringing together a larger picture, articulating a rich and complicated story of our shared history.

The extraordinary needlework skills in these quilts undoubtedly tell human stories, some not easy to tell, but each deserving a platform. My design explores these ideas, choosing no single unifying style, but celebrating the uniqueness and individuality of each quilt maker.

Ali is a Northumberland based professional artist who studied and worked in the fashion and textiles industry. Her artworks observe the composition of patterns as an artform. Using the irregularities found in the everyday she builds a repetition of elements that begin to tell a story. 

Ali has previously painted her designs onto a variety of large scale sculptures and is a published illustrator, helping create books that have become best sellers. As an environmental artist, her current work is inspired by the textures and the chaotic patterns of the underwater world. With an emphasis on illustration, her work blends traditional painting with digital techniques. Her work is commissioned commercially by clients in the UK, USA, Europe and Australia.

Gil’s design responds to the theme ‘Reimagine the Future’, which gives us free rein to imagine the society we can create when we have a full understanding of our shared history; the place the UK can hold in the world when it acknowledges its past; and who we can be as people and a country when we give full dignity to all.

The New Union Flag (NUF) reimagines the Union Jack and celebrates the communities that have contributed to the UK’s cultural legacy. Recreated with fabric designs from all over the world, the New Union Flag transforms the traditional Union Jack from an archetype of uniformity into a dynamic and celebrational ongoing performance of diversity. Whilst this flag started as a reflection of the UK’s colonial legacy, its design is ever-changing to reflect the ongoing changes in the makeup of this nation. 

For The World Reimagined, the 2D Flag was redesigned to fit the globe sculpture and the Reimagine The Future theme. 

From 2015, the New Union Flag has evolved every few months with the contributions of participants from various national and ethnic backgrounds. For three years it has engaged thousands of people through gallery exhibitions – Turner Contemporary, Tate Modern, South Bank Centre, People’s History Museum Manchester, Liverpool Museum, The Jewish Museum, Rich Mix and more – as well as through numerous cultural events, school visits, festivals, rallies, and workshops. 

The New Union Flag project includes photoshoots and video-recorded conversations with people who would like to see it adopted as the national flag – as well as others who don’t. The flag was part of social gatherings and demonstrations and was used in public space interventions. The New Union Flag project is in constant development and invitations for exhibitions, public talks and workshops are welcomed.

Gil Mualem-Doron is an award-winning socially engaged artist and photographer. In his work he investigates issues such as identity and diasporic spaces, social and racial justice, “place making” and transcultural aesthetics. While often using participatory and collaborative practices much of his work is informed also by his own complex identity and lived experiences of marginalisation. Not having formal fine-art training and with a background in architecture, photography, research and activism his work is trans-disciplinary and varied in media and scale. In the past decade his work included mass workshops and participatory photoshoots in Museums, galleries and community centres, street interventions, creation of agitprops as well as more traditional forms including studio photography, large scale installations and digital art. His work has been exhibited extensively in the UK, Europe and the Middle East including Tate Modern, the Turner Contemporary, Liverpool Museum and as well as in galleries and museums in the US, Netherlands, Berlin, Spain, Israel-Palestine and South Africa.

www.gmdart.com