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If you’ve been meandering around the City of London or Hackney recently, you may have noticed some huge, spectacular globes dotted around the streets. The artworks are part of a new nationwide art trial organised by education charity The World Reimagined to encourage learning during Black History Month.
The exhibition, which has four trails across the capital, is called the ‘Journey of Discovery’ and each globe (there are 100 of them in total) tells a different story about the contribution of Black people to the UK. The public is invited to follow trails across the city and trace the lost – or more accurately, hidden – history of Black Britons.
Former ‘EastEnders’ actor and current star of ‘Harry Potter and the Cursed Child’ in the West End, Michelle Gayle, has spearheaded the exhibition. She said: ‘Each globe progressively tells you more and more about the [slave] trade but also about the contribution of the descendants of Africans.’
‘I wanted to facilitate a very difficult conversation with this project,’ she added. ‘We created a trail, we call it the “Journey of Discovery” and it takes you through a step-by-step, very visceral and very comprehensive, view of Black people’s contributions.’
Contributions that Black Brits have made across film, music and philosophy are highlighted by the different artists behind each sculpture, while the trail is not shy about Britain’s role in the transatlantic slave trade.
One globe, ‘The Road to Freedom, Hidden in Plan Sight’, by Asiko Okelarin, encourages visitors to look deeper into the slave trade and understand how racial injustice is still unrelenting.
There are four spectacular trails across London. The Camden to Westminster trail begins at the British Library and finishes at Buckingham Palace. The Southwark to Lambeth route starts in Peckham, snakes up to Borough Market and goes back through Brixton before finishing by Brockwell Park. The Hackney to Newham route starts in Dalston, goes through the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and ends in Stratford. The City of London route does a loop through Leadenhall Market and around St Paul’s.
‘Journey of Discovery’ is also in UK cities including Birmingham, Bristol, Leicester, Liverpool and Swansea. You can find maps of the London trails here.
Check out more Black History Month events for 2022.
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