The launch night featured inspiring speeches from the Mayor of Lambeth, Ibrahim Dogus; the Mayoress of Lewisham, Barbara Gray, and EVEWRIGHT. The artist dedicated the exhibition to his mother, Clarice Reid, who was present and is one of the Windrush Generation elders featured in the installation.

 

This pop-up exhibition is based on an installation originally staged in Colchester, Essex in 2018 by artist EVEWRIGHT, who took over and transformed S&S Caribbean Takeaway, the only Caribbean-owned working takeaway in Colchester. The idea was to create an innovative and engaging installation in an informal
setting owned and controlled by the Caribbean community. 

 

The Caribbean takeaway is an important cultural meeting place in the Caribbean community. A home from home, the kitchen is where meals are prepared, but also where stories are exchanged and shared. Going back to African roots, cooking and the Dutch pot or cooking pot was the central place for the family activity. The takeaway has just as much cultural importance as the barbershop and the hairdressing salon for black communities living and working in the UK.

 

This installation has now been transferred as a site-specific experience at the Migration Museum's Breathing Space Café.  For one month, the Café has been taken over, repurposed and transformed into an art installation featuring limited edition photo etchings of 12 Windrush Generation elders produced by EVEWRIGHT, along with audio interviews and sound recordings of these Windrush Pioneers compiled by his team at Evewright Arts Foundation (EAF).

 

If you have not had a chance to see the installation yet then this is one not to be missed. It is an immersive experience with walls and table tops covered in vinyls, photographs and documents of participants to reflect their lives and memories. Listen to Alford Gardner's experience on the SS Empire Windrush in 1948, hear how these 12 elders tackled racism, and how through their perseverance and resilience they were able to overcome barriers to make a life in Britain. 
Their legacy has made a lasting and positive impact on Britain today.  

 

Visitors are encouraged to commemorate their own or their parent's arrival by adding their stories to passport postcards on our 'memory wall' or online.