Can Art Save Us?

A World Leading Sculptor on every Level

Basil Watson is a Jamaican sculptor now based in the USA, and over a 45 year career, he has achieved international recognition as one of the world's leading sculptors. He was awarded the highest order of distinction, Commander Class, by the government of Jamaica, and his distinction through service continues today. Basil's outstanding work serves the development of global harmony, he speaks to equality, justice and peace, always remaining humble, dedicated to his artistic service. He's also the son of Barrington Watson one of Jamaica's most eminent artists who became an internationally renowned painter. He was a pioneer leading cultural change in the recognition of and possibility for black artists and art runs throughout Basil's family, including his brother, sister and son, who are all artists. This is a family legacy sharing an artistic language that speaks universally to humanity. Basil is responsible for iconic statement sculptures that reach out emotionally capturing the spirits and personality of his subjects. Just some of his well known work includes Jamaican sprinter, the eight time Olympic gold medalist, Usain Bolt, Civil Rights leader, and one of the greatest speakers of all time, Martin Luther King and the National Windrush Monument, unveiled by Prince William in Britain. Basil understands the important role of the arts in leadership. And in his own words, “global harmony is critical for the survival of humanity and for the creation of a world in which all mankind can live productive and creative lives.” We talk about the courage to follow your creative path, to hold onto your moral and artistic integrity, to keep moving forward and to always think of the bigger picture.
Season 4 features 7 Windrush specific interviews with world class and award winning artists, just look for titles with 'Windrush 75.'
Series Audio Editor - Joey Quan.
Series Music - Courtesy of Barry J. Gibb
Closed Captions are added to all interviews in this series. Read only, text versions of every interview can also be found here: https://www.canartsaveus.com
Discover Basil Watson: https://basilsculpture.com/home.html

Art Activism with a Political and Poetical Voice - Windrush 75

Zita Holbourne is a multi award winning multidisciplinary artist, author, poet, curator and vocalist. She's an experienced trade union and community activist and her artwork responds to social and climate justice, human rights and equality. Zita was elected to the TUC National Race Relations Committee and the Women's Committee and she's joint National Chair of the Union for Artists. As a human rights campaigner, and educator she believes in practical solidarity, and for years she's raised funds for humanitarian aid missions. She's the National Chair of Black Activists Rising Against Cuts which she co-founded in 2010, initially in response to government austerity. She's also founded the Roots, Culture, Identity art collective, curating exhibitions to showcase the art of young black and migrant artists. Through arts activism she campaigns against all forms of discrimination, including the discriminatory cuts in the UK arts and culture sectors already in 2023 achievements include being one of the winning submissions for the Jessica Kingsley writers prize entitled, Roots and Rebellion Personal Stories of Resisting Racism and Reclaiming Identity. She has been nominated for Arts, Culture and Community Influencer in the Caribbean Global Awards 2023 and her artwork was commissioned for the Voices of Windrush festival, commemorating and celebrating the 75th anniversary of the Windrush generation arriving into Britain. We talk about art speaking to scandal, to hope, to commemorating the lost, the loved and leaders of positive, social change. We talk about art as a healer, a teacher and a friend.
Season 4 features 7 Windrush specific interviews with world class and award winning artists, just look for titles with 'Windrush 75.'
Photo Credits:
Largest, central photo of Zita Holbourne © Josimar Senior, Black Writers Guild 
Top left, photo of Zita Holbourne © Elizabeth Dalziel, Women Activists of East London exhibition .
Bottom right, Artwork by © Zita Holbourne for the Voices of Windrush Festival
Series Audio Editor - Joey Quan.
Series Music - Courtesy of Barry J. Gibb
Closed Captions are added to all interviews in this series. Read only, text versions of every interview can also be found here: https://www.canartsaveus.com
Discover the Roots, Culture, Identity Exhibition: https://www.tuc.org.uk/RootsCultureIdentity
Discover Voices of Windrush Festival: https://voicesofwindrush.com/
Discover Zita Holbourne: https://linktr.ee/ZitaBARACUK
 

Journeys of Laughter and Legacy - Windrush 75

John Simmit founded the Upfront Comedy Empire. He's a comedian, producer, actor and theatre performer enjoying current success in the musical Rush, a "joyous Jamaican journey" earning five star reviews and sellout shows. For 30 years, John has promoted black comedy in Britain, and alongside comedy tours, he has built a network of clubs nationwide. He's credited by The Guardian newspaper as "the man who put British black comedy on the map," and he also regularly showcased talent he brought over from the United States. Early on in his career, John made a name for himself in the Real McCoy, a hit BBC television comedy show featuring Black and Asian stars that quickly reached audiences of 5 million. He's also known for his character in the second most successful TV show ever in terms of sales. The multiple BAFTA award winning Teletubbies, John played Dipsy and Britain's only Cuban-Jamaican-Brummie brought reggae and Caribbean culture into preschool programming. From the surreal to the comedy of life, John brings us joy, and humor. We talk about Rush, musical theatre combing history with hits to tell the story of Windrush. We talk about the legacy and political scandal of Windrush and the courage, generosity and kindness of comedy. 
Season 4 features 7 Windrush specific interviews with world class and award winning artists, just look for titles with 'Windrush 75.'
Series Audio Editor - Joey Quan.
Series Music - Courtesy of Barry J. Gibb
Closed Captions are added to all interviews in this series. Read only, text versions of every interview can also be found here: https://www.canartsaveus.com
Discover Rush: https://rushtheatrecompany.co.uk/

From the Caribbean to Hackney, Struggle to Stage - Windrush 75

Dr Michael McMillan is an artist, author, playwright and curator. His plays and performance pieces have been produced by the Royal Court Theatre, Channel 4, BBC Radio 4 Drama and across the UK. He’s a Visiting Professor of Creative Writing at the University of the Arts, London and an Associate Lecturer, teaching Cultural & Historical Studies at the London College of Fashion. Michael was born to immigrant parents from St. Vincent and the Grenadines and his work explores family, identity and generation in a migrant context. His curation and installation of a 1970s West Indian Front Room at the Geffrye Museum had more than 35, 000 visitors and has since become a permanent exhibition at the now Museum of the Home. A new iteration of this 1970s interior was recently included at Tate Britain’s landmark exhibition; “Life Between Islands,” exploring Caribbean-British art over four generations. Amongst the 5 star reviews, The Guardian described the exhibition as ”a mind-altering portrait of British Caribbean life through art.”  We talk about the significance of the Windrush generation versus government scandal, the struggle behind rich cultural exchange, the political fear of art, the vital integrity of an artist, courage when your identity is made a target and the experience that changed Michael's life when he was only 16. Michael is a true educator.
Season 4 features 7 Windrush specific interviews with world class and award winning artists, just look for titles with 'Windrush 75.'
Series Audio Editor - Courtesy of Joey Quan.
Series Music - Courtesy of Barry J. Gibb
Images: The Museum of the Home
Closed Captions are added to all interviews in this series. Read only, text versions of every interview can also be found here: https://www.canartsaveus.com
Discover Dr. Michael McMillan's Front Room here: https://www.museumofthehome.org.uk/whats-on/rooms-through-time/a-front-room-in-1976/
 

Still Dancing (Shirley May Special Edition) Windrush 75

In this special edition, short interview, I had the pleasure to talk again to Shirley May who featured in Season 3 which was dedicated to poetry and spoken word artists. Shirley May is an acclaimed poet, writer and an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of literature. She is also CEO and Artistic Director of Young Identity, Manchester's premier spoken word collective in the UK. To complement her one hour episode, repeated in Season 4, see listing, She Wrote Her Own Eulogy, this special edition celebrates Windrush 75. We talk about the experience of her parents leaving Jamaica for Britain and Shirley shares stories not included in her book 'She Wrote Her Own Eulogy.' We talk about her mother's active, community work supporting citizenship administration and her father's resilience and response to racism. Find out who is 'still dancing' and why the commemorative events of Windrush 75 are so important. See additional links and Young Identity interviews below.
Season 4 features 7 Windrush specific interviews with world class and award winning artists, just look for titles with 'Windrush 75.'
You can hear more from the Young Identity poets in Season 3 too, who also share Caribbean and African heritage. See Season 3 listings:
'The Courage and Craft of Two Poets'
'Pain, Poetry and a Jamaican born Nigerian Princess'.
 
Discover Shirley May and Young Identity: https://www.youngidentity.org/
 
Series Audio Editor - Courtesy of Joey Quan.
Series Music - Courtesy of Barry J. Gibb
Closed Captions are added to all interviews in this series. Read only, text versions of every interview can also be found here: https://www.canartsaveus.com
 

She Wrote Her Own Eulogy - Windrush 75

Shirley May is an acclaimed poet, writer and an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of literature. She is also CEO and Artistic Director of Young Identity, Manchester's premier spoken word collective in the UK. In 2006, Shirley founded the Inner Voice, a voluntary Youth Arts Project that 16 dedicated years later, has become Young Identity, a literature and performance arts charity. Young Identity now has the prestigious status of being a national portfolio organisation with the UK Arts Council. In other words, Young Identity is recognized as a leader both in their field and in our collective national arts. Shirley's work is described as "blazing with emotion, challenging all the senses." We talk about her work responding to pain and pride in the experience of migration, her Jamaican heritage and in African history. We start with how one day "she woke up with a poem in her mouth," how "the word was first" and developing the "risk of excellence," in marginalised youth today. Young Identity is important legacy work that talks to truth.
This episode first featured in Season 3 (Speak Your Excellence). As part of the Windrush 75 commemorations and celebrations, Season 4 includes this episode again and it is also complimented with an additional short interview with Shirley May. This is listed in Season 4 as 'Still Dancing - Windrush 75,' in which Shirley talks specifically about the experience of her parents leaving Jamaica for Britain, including experiences not previously published in her book, "She Wrote Her Own Eulogy." Her parents came in response to the call to help rebuild Britain post WWII and she talks about why the Windrush 75 Anniversary and events are so important in response to both legacy and scandal. (More links below).
Season 4 features 7 Windrush specific interviews with world class and award winning artists, just look for titles with 'Windrush 75.'
You can hear more from the Young Identity poets in Season 3 too, who also share Caribbean and African heritage. See Season 3 listings:
'The Courage and Craft of Two Poets'
'Pain, Poetry and a Jamaican born Nigerian Princess'.
 
Series Audio Editor - Courtesy of Joey Quan.
Series Music - Courtesy of Barry J. Gibb
Closed Captions are added to all interviews in this series. Read only, text versions of every interview can also be found here: https://www.canartsaveus.com
Discover Shirley May here:
https://www.youngidentity.org/                                 
https://www.shirleyannemay.co.uk/
 

A Photographer’s Caribbean Voyage - Windrush 75

Jim Grover, a social documentary photographer who deep dives respectfully into the hearts and minds of people in his local communities. Living in South Clapham London, he is rewarded with a rich tapestry of life. His work celebrates 75 years of Windrush stories and Caribbean culture, 25 years of the ordination of women into the Church of England priesthood and he has captured Covid stories from a single park bench during the global crisis. He celebrated the life of Maurice Dorfman, who ran the longest surviving independent shop on Clapham High Street. Maurice was the grandchild of Ukrainian refugees who arrived in 1902, fleeing anti-semitic violence in what was then part of Russia. And this is what Jim does. He looks behind shop facades into West Indian Dominoes clubs and Jamaican front rooms. He attends gravesides and community meetings. Like his first major project entitled 'Of Things Unseen,' Jim looks behind all of those walls that can stop us from seeing our shared human experience and from connecting. His work is described as 'poignant, intimate, moving, and often beautiful.' And the Times, the Observer, The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, Time Out, the BBC, the British Journal of photography are all a part of the British media and more that respects his work in return. We talk about trust and ethics in Jim's role as a social documentary photographer with access to homes, funerals and deeply personal stories.
Season 4 features 7 Windrush specific interviews with world class and award winning artists, just look for titles with 'Windrush 75.'
Series Audio Editor - Courtesy of Joey Quan.
Closed Captions are added to all interviews in this series. Read only, text versions of every interview can also be found here: https://www.canartsaveus.com
Discover Jim Grover: http://www.jimgroverphotography.com/
The Windrush Exhibition: https://www.windrushvoyagethroughthegenerations.com/
 

A Cameroonian Clay Addict Spotlights the World Stage of Ceramics.

Cameroonian clay addict, Djakou Kassi Nathalie, is a ceramic artist now based in Nigeria. With over 30 years of practice and numerous prestigious awards, this is statement art that understands architectural design, artistic innovation and creative craft. Natalie responds to discrimination, racism, solidarity, human and environmental violence, education and equality. Her work combines contemporary issues with ancestry always reflecting her deep love and admiration of African art. Her use of the iconic African mask carved into her clay in repetitive patterns, is like a language of love, showing the cultural roots of her life that continues to flourish with possibility. From objects to sculpted figures, all of her work, just like her larger-than-life fist clenched in solidarity ‘Speaks Out.’ We talk about fighting for her place at the only art school and the cultural disapproval, learning to be creatively fearless, to be a mother figure to her siblings and in the community and how she is an inspirational educator. We talk about the power of art as knowledge and our responsibility to educate each other. We talk about love over brutality and how the use of her iconic African mask is also a statement of human accountability in the world.
We were relying on a power generator lasting for this interview and Nathalie was kindly working in a second language too. I asked her to write an additional few words in her first language in response to the question, Can art save us?
L'art peut nous sauver si les sujets abordés par les artistes sont pertinents et accessibles au plus grand nombre et surtout accessibles aux plus jeunes . L'art peut nous sauver à travers une education permanente sur les sujets de société en revelant et en proposant des solutions à travers l'expression artistique que ce soit par la musique, le theatre les arts visuels, les performances, l'ecriture ou autres formes artistiques. L' art peut nous sauver en nous montrant l'autre facette des choses que nous voyons mal.
 
Translation: Art can save us if the subjects addressed by the artists are relevant and accessible to the greatest number of people and especially accessible to the youngest. Art can save us through a lifelong education on social issues by revealing and proposing solutions through artistic expression whether through music, theater, visual arts, performances, writing or others art form. Art can save us by showing us the other side of things we see are wrong.
 
Series Audio Editor - Joey Quan.
Series Music - Courtesy of Barry J. Gibb
Closed Captions are added to all interviews in this series. Read only, text versions of every interview can also be found here: https://www.canartsaveus.com
Discover Djakou Kassi Nathalie:
51.3k Followers https://www.instagram.com/djakoukassi/?hl=en

Two Bodies with One Voice on Poetry, Dance and the Law.

What does a commended poet, dancer of the Indian, classical form Kathak, outstanding legal academic and occasional writer in the hope-punk story genre, have in common? One person it seems, Bhumika Billa. What stands out is Bhumika’s astonishing ability to communicate through dance, language and legal linguistics. She has a sharp eye on identity, whether it’s her own as an Indian woman living in the UK, the gendered constraints on her female ancestors, gender and sexual politics today, social class or caste and the digital identity that we now adopt or are arguably forced into. In 2021, the BBC recognised Bhumika as one of Britain’s most exciting emerging spoken word artists and she has been a finalist in several, prestigious slams since then. She is in the business of observing and unravelling the intricacies of data politics, artificial intelligence and law, structural inequality and the future we all face if we don’t stand up for justice. We talk about living in two bodies, the male gaze, anger, curiosity as a privilege, freedom and storytelling through dance and poetry. 
Series Audio Editor - Joey Quan.
Series Music - Courtesy of Barry J. Gibb
Closed Captions are added to all interviews in this series. Read only, text versions of every interview can also be found here: https://www.canartsaveus.com
Discover Bhumika Billa:
https://applesandsnakes.org/2022/11/25/bhumika-billa-my-mother-lives-in-me/
 

The Faerytale Doctor, a Shamanic Pathway to Community Service.

Can you imagine making an appointment to see Dr. Lovely or better still the Faerytale Doctor? Would you be open to the spiritual practice of shamanism through storytelling as a way of navigating your life or to find a compass for your soul? Could we all benefit from connecting to something sacred to help us find ourselves in our ever complex and intense world? Elizabeth Lovely begun her shamanic pathway with the 'breaking of her brain,' when she had to find new ways to interpret her life. After her vibrant and hectic years in theatre and arts festivals she turned to indigenous spiritual practices, a deeply held respect for shamanism and the art of storytelling. We don't talk about conjuring up magic and trickery but how to find connections to live better. We talk about shamans as healers, as the first visionary artists, accepting the sacred as real, life in community service and making plenty of cups of courage tea.
Series Audio Editor - Joey Quan.
Series Music - Courtesy of Barry J. Gibb
Closed Captions are added to all interviews in this series. Read only, text versions of every interview can also be found here: https://www.canartsaveus.com
Discover Elizabeth Lovely: https://faerytaleapothecary.wixsite.com/sacredstories/elizabethjanelovely