In support of Black Lives Matter, we have commissioned a further two artworks as part of our UTOPIA series; one to champion and platform a Black artist, and one to highlight the important work being done by community mental health group, Mary Seacole House, who are run by and primarily for people of colour. We invited both to respond to our commission brief as they saw fit.
SYMONÉ
Symoné is a multidisciplinary performer. She is currently developing an ongoing project, UTOPIAN (t&c’s apply), a live performance piece that responds to the abuse of power roles in cults and underground party culture. Conflicting with their guise of utopia, Symoné relieves the darker side, exploring brainwashing and the abuse of power that can happen in these environments.
For UTOPIA, Symoné has provided a glimpse of UTOPIAN (t&c's apply) in a movement video piece called, OASIS. Symoné envisions an environment with a sense of collective euphoria and togetherness.
Distorting fact and fiction, Symoné plays with the viewer's curiosity by inviting them to make assumptions about which parts of her past are true, and which are false. Through this, she opens her work up for speculation, and reclaims power from the audience’s lack of knowing her reality. In return for sharing her secrets, she invites the audience to confide in her, and anonymously share secrets with her to further develop her work and inspire future content.
Symoné initially applied to work with us on UTOPIA but due to living outside the North West, was not eligible for the commission, despite the incredible strength of her application and personal connection to the project. In light of this, we wanted to commission Symoné to help her develop her live art production and link it to our commission series with her ongoing project.
MARY SEACOLE HOUSE
Mary Seacole House is a charity based in Toxteth, set up to provide support services primarily to people of colour and refugees with mental health issues.
Some of their members, volunteers, and staff have responded to the themes of UTOPIA by exploring their thoughts on the current social climate through photography, collage, and writing. Service users have taken part in various activities to create a collection of postcards that document their experience of 2020, envisioned to be sent out to a future generation.
Mary Seacole House facilitates a weekly art session that engages members in a range of creative activities in a social and supportive setting. The sessions have temporarily stopped due to COVID-19, however a range of creative resources and activities have been made accessible for members to engage in from home. We are planning towards working with Mary Seacole House in the new year, helping their service users work towards producing an exhibition together and facilitating workshops in our gallery when it is safe to do so.