Uprising & Resistance

Remi Graves is a London based poet and drummer. A former Barbican Young Poet, Remi’s work has been commissioned by St Paul’s Cathedral, Barbican and BBC Radio 4. Remi has taught at The Poetry School and performed at Cheltenham Literature Festival, Tate Modern and more. Remi’s debut pamphlet with your chest will be published by Fourteen Poems in September 2022.

Dr. Keith Jarrett’s work explores Caribbean British identity, religion and sexuality. A multiple poetry slam champion, he was selected for the International Literary Showcase as one of 10 outstanding LGBT writers in the UK. His poem, ‘From the Log Book’, was projected onto St. Paul’s Cathedral and broadcast as a commemorative installation. His play, Safest Spot in Town, was performed at the Old Vic and aired on BBC Four. Selah, his poetry collection, was published in 2017. Keith teaches at NYU in London and is completing his debut novel.

Photo credit: Naomi Woddis

Jess Nash is an illustrator currently based in the South East. She enjoys making work based on her love for culture and social commentary. She also really enjoys exploring the idea of art and education, and how the former informs the latter.

Alexandre White, PhD is an Assistant Professor in the Johns Hopkins, Department of Sociology. He is jointly affiliated with the Department of the History of Medicine as an Assistant Professor in the School of Medicine and is an Associate Director for the Center For Medical Humanities and Social Medicine at Johns Hopkins. He is also a Co-Primary Investigator on Black Beyond Data, a Mellon Funded project in collaboration with Johns Hopkins University.

Gboyega Odubanjo was born and raised in east London. He is an editor of bath magg and the author of two poetry pamphlets, While I Yet Live (Bad Betty Press, 2019) and Aunty Uncle Poems (Smith|Doorstop, 2021).

Ink Sweat & Tears is an online poetry and prose web zine run by Kate Birch and edited by the poet Helen Ivory with a small print publishing arm. IS&T Press pamphlet The Red and Yellow Nothing by Jay Bernard, in part ‘an inquiry into the idea of blackness in Europe before it became synonymous with a less romantic history’, was shortlisted for the 2016 Ted Hughes Award for New Writing in Poetry. IS&T has launched a paid editing internship programme specifically geared towards writers and poets of colour. www.inksweatandtears.co.uk

Courtney Conrad is a Jamaican poet. She is an Eric Gregory Award winner, Bridport Prize Young Writers Award recipient and has been shortlisted for The White Review Poet’s Prize, Manchester Poetry Prize and Oxford Brookes International Poetry Prize. Her poems have appeared in Magma Poetry, Poetry Wales, The White Review, Stand Magazine, Bath Magg and Poetry Birmingham Literary Journal. Her work has been anthologised by Anamot Press, Re.creation, Peekash Press, Bad Betty Press and Flipped Eye Press. She is an alumna of The London Library Emerging Writers Programme, Malika’s Poetry Kitchen, Barbican Young Poets, Obsidian Foundation and Roundhouse Poetry Collective.

“I believe this project is very important, we are often encouraged and forced to dismiss the full extent of our ancestors’ exploitation. I think it is vital that we continue to examine and question the past and what we have been told is the full truth/extent of our ancestors’ tragic experiences. It is important to make the understanding of their reality accessible and I think poetry does that in an impactful way.”

malakaï is an artist, producer and educator from pre-gentrified Hackney, London. Led by curiosity and care, malakaï works across theatre, literature and live performance – creating and interrogating through an unapologetically Afroqueer lens. A Barbican Young Poets alumnus (2016-17), malakaï has been commissioned by the likes of Apples & Snakes, Nationwide, the RSC and the Royal Court. Their creative nonfiction piece on social cleansing, ‘The Latte Drinker that Spilled the Tea’, was published in the anthology 21 Stories From Britain’s Youth (Unbound, 2019), edited by Nikesh Shukla, with excerpts republished in VICE and The Independent. malakaï is co-creative director of literary arts organisation BORN::FREE, and remains passionate about expanding the canon of Afro-diasporic writing across its forms. They are currently undertaking an MA in Black British Literature at Goldsmiths University of London.

“Meandering through archives is always a cathartic process for me; the revelations that emerge always seem to bring me closer to an understanding of myself, though often I find that the materials speak to wider discourses about the systematic erasure of people, narratives and the burying of uncomfortable truths. I’m curious to see what’s revealed to me in this project, and collaborating interdisciplinary to birth new truths.”

Levi Naidu-Mitchell is an interdisciplinary artist, currently based in West London. Her practice centres around the Carnivalesque, its dynamism as an artistic medium and the plethora of ways it can be translated as a tool for positive elevation. Workshop facilitation, site specific projects and collaboration are all fundamental to her creations and she deems it essential to work intergenerationally, always considering the legacies that we produce through our art. 

“This project is an incredible opportunity to explore a pertinent void; through our collective response to this archive I am intrigued to begin a journey of filling silences, with voices that can hopefully translate, permeate and further shed light on so much that has been kept in the dark.”