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Bread and Roses, co-directed & co-curated multi-strand arts festival

The Lambeth-based Bread and Roses Festival marked the centenary of the successful Bread and Roses strike for improved working conditions by women in the textile factories of Massachusetts. The festival aimed to investigate the interaction between workers’ rights and capitalism through performance art, photography (historical and contemporary) and documentary and fiction film. This was a new type of research for me, as a co-director and co-curator, and raised questions of how to curate a festival combining film, photography, music performance art and installation art, and how to engage the local community with the arts and the festival’s themes.

The festival showcased a broad range of films, from new releases to rarely seen work. All community-hosted screenings and art events were free to attend. Screenings were held in the Clapham Common bandstand, the studioSTRIKE community cinema, community centres and cinemas across Lambeth. We secured the UK premiere of the acclaimed Uprising of ’34; incorporated a live musical score to Eisenstein’s Strike and Srdjan Keca’s Mirage films; and presented previously unseen archive films from the London Screen Study Collection. The outdoor art programme included political performance art, artists’ films, and readings. We also curated a photography exhibition, including images from the Lambeth Archive. Live music included the Clapham Community Choir.

A key aim was to foster debates around the themes of the festival. Fifteen of the twenty-one screenings had an after-event with not only filmmakers but also barristers, activists, journalists and local community groups such as the Women’s Institute. We have maintained contact with our audiences since the festival through social media and newsletters.

The festival received external funding from the Arts Council, Film London, Battersea and Wandsworth Trades Council, the Lipman and Miliband Trust, the GMB and the Workers Beer Company.