Join Brighton Book Festival for a multi-day extravaganza, celebrating the contributions of Caribbean communities to Britain. Events will include two family festivals, a poetry workshop for young people and an evening of celebrations to mark Windrush Day on 22nd June.
At our family festivals you can enjoy crafting with Afrori Books, creating poems with our poet on the sofa, a read-a-long with Patrice Lawrence, hair education and writing workshops along with lunch and goody bags for all.
Attend our poetry workshop where you can develop your writing with Canal Laureate Roy McFarlane and AFLO. the Poet. Create a piece together on the theme of Windrush Day, hear their tips and tricks and receive feedback on writing and performance.
Come along to our 75th Anniversary Windrush Celebrations on the evening of June 22nd to hear from authors Louise Hare, Charlie Brinkhurst-Cuff, Colin Grant, Rosanna Amaka and Windrush voices
across generations as they share their experiences, inspiration and outlook for the future. We’ll also be serving up some delicious Caribbean cuisine and will be treated to performances by some brilliant poets and musicians.
The evening will focus on three areas each celebrating an aspect of Caribbean history and culture:
1. Food and music. A carnival atmosphere as we enjoy our resident DJ and local entrepreneurs from Brighton sharing food from around the Caribbean. Hang, chill, meet new folks.
2. Exhibition: photography, film and textiles. Experience a snippet of British history for yourself as you walk through our exhibition of archives from all over the UK telling the story of the real people of Windrush and their descendants.
3. Windrush voices. Come and hear the stories of the Windrush generation and their descendants live in their own words. Interviews with change making authors, nurses, transport workers, post
office workers and many more.
Along with our speakers there will be VIP guests from the Windrush community sharing the evening with us, as well as local organisations that serve the community.
Central to our celebrations on June 22nd researcher and cultural producer Pauline Rutter is creating an arts installation that evokes the stories and experiences of people from the Windrush era. Artists, organisers and communicators who arrived in Britain after 1945, will feature within a large-scale collage at the CCA Gallery Brighton. This installation will include archival video footage and history panels developed with the support of London and Brighton based archives. The work will conjure the spirit of community building and the essence of the individual activities of some of the first folk, particularly women, to arrive in Britain between World War two and the 1960s. It places them in conversation with each other and invites reflection on their stories and the experiences of the many others who arrived all those decades ago and whose lives continue to lift us up.
For tickets and the full line up, take a look here: Windrush 75th Anniversary Celebration Tickets, Thu 22 Jun 2023 at 19:30 | Eventbrite