B.O.O.K
(2020-2023)
This communal project was an invitation to rethink and remake knowledge and culture on our own terms. B.O.O.K (r)evolved through radical sharing, caring and disrupting, by using and developing non-extractive collective mechanisms for re-inventing the everyday as a political space for collective heal- ing and liberation.
The soft infrastructure of B.O.O.K has been supported by a self-organised working group composed of 9 Black artists, writers, researchers, facilitators and curators including: Antonio Roberts, Mojere Ajayi-Egunjobi, Jae Tallawah, Samiir Saunders, Sym Mendez, Last Mafuba, Hannah Adereti, Ayesha Jones, and, melissandre varin.
We ran artist residencies and commissioned West-Midlands-based Black artists; we produced the B.O.O.K podcast inviting Black artworkers to share their knowledge; we held space for B.O.O.K clubs in the form of collective reading, and dreaming inspired by Black-authored publications for children and adults; we organised a B.O.O.K retreat; we also curated film interventions at Vivid Projects, Public House, and Yard Art House - Birmingham to support Black filmmakers.
image credit: Ayesha Jones