Anand Chhabra’s exhibtion for the Living Memory Project has unfortunately had to be cancelled but understandably so in the interest of public safety because of COVID-19, the virus that is shaking the world at the time of writing. The exhibtion was due to start from 4th April. Largely Anand was asked to be based in Dudley by Geoff Broadway director of the Living Memory project. Anand chose to work with students at Dudley College as well as conduct research on this area of interest surrounding Punjabi workers. We are looking to reschedule the exhibtion and base it in Walsall later in the summer, should the issues abate surrounding coronavirus. Here are some of the images that were due to go on display as part of Anand’s research into archives of early migrant Punjabi workers lives in the Black Country. All current portraits © Anand Chhabra
Black Country Visual Arts
'Moving to the City' - Exhibition launch & Artist Talk by Anand Chhabra Feb 7th 2020 - Arts Council England funded
‘Moving to the City’ has been a fantastic & enjoyable project to work for our Director Anand Chhabra. This project was commissioned by WAAS & funded by Arts Council England, Anand worked with various ethnic community groups in Worcester during 2018-19 co-creating work them for exhibition in Feb 2020. The work which comprised of various mosaic images & portraits (x4) 6ft x 4 ft portrait sculptures were then exhibited at The HIVE in Worcester where he held his residency during this time. The launch event was a great time celebrating the project with participants and colleagues from HIVe as well as arts organisations from the region. Special thanks to HIVE & WAAS colleagues in ensuring a great space for visitors to enjoy this work. Many positive words written about the artwork on the visitors book.
'Moving to the City' exhibtion invites have gone out!
Looking forward to the invite Invitation : Moving to the City
Exhibition Launch and Artist Talk
Please join us for the launch event of 'Moving to the City'. Artist Anand Chhabra will be exhibting a series of portrait diptychs commissioned by HIVE Worcester and in partnership with Arts Council England. The artist will present a talk about his participatory arts practise amongst migrant communities who have settled within the City of Worcester. Anand's large scale mosaics have been co-created with individuals, school pupils and community groups through
photography workshops during his residency.
The exhibition will be officially launched by the City's Mayor after a short talk by the Artist in the Studio room. Light refereshments will be available.
TIME: 6.30p.m - 8.00p.m 11th Feb 2020
VENUE : The HIVE Sawmill Close. The Butts, Worcester WR1 3PD.
National Trust Artists, Academics & Evaluation - Informing the Eastern Museum in a 'Year of listening'
Working as a Community Engagement Consultant for the National Trust property at Kedleston Hall in Derby for their Year of Listening, Anand has been working reaching out to communities and encouraging them to explore the collection as well as help inform Kedleston Hall as to how to share the future curation of the Museum. For many of these such communities living in Derby they have been invited to explore freely and feedback to the National Trust reasons to bring about the changes needed for the Eastern Museum and how they would like to see a future curation take shape with their own cultural reasons for doing so.
Anand thought it would be good idea to invite a group of artists and academics and University students from South Asian origin to also put inform the year of listening at Kedleston. Joining up with Derby Museums, various days were held to invite small groups with big minds to feedback to the team of staff at Kedleston.
We also met to evaluate how far Kedleston hall has moved in community relationships through Anand’s role (see last two photographs) and the good news has been its been an upwards trajectory with links from communities, stakeholders and organisations, artists and academics for the Trust to build on going forward!
Diwan Manna at Dudley College.
December was an intense month for projects as Anand arranged a number of things for Dudley College students to to be enlightened on, this event was arranged for Anand’s work on the Living Memory Project whereby Anand was commissioned to be situated in Dudley town. With Diwan Manna president of the Punjab Lalit Kala Akademie in Chandigarh, Punjab, India arriving in the UK. Anand asked if Diwan would visit & inspire the students by his own arts work as he is a collected photographic artist in some of the worlds major institutions. Diwan agreed & has been a great supporter and bent over backwards in getting the message about the archive in all the media across India and televised an interview with Parul an award wining journalist from the Punjab. That particular interview has been seen around the world by Punjabi’s internationally and even from people in Wolverhampton where it originated! There is not a media outlet that I didn’t conduct some sort of interview with through Diwan’s network right across North India in the short time I was there. BCVA is in much gratitude for what DIwan achieved on our behalf! Diwan spoke to a packed audience and articulated what it takes to be a artist through his amazing work, inspiring students to move on to higher education and think like an artist in order to develop their work further. Anand also arranged for Diwan to speak later in the week at University of Wolverhampton to Degree students there and managed to agree a future student exchange visits with the course leader.
Supnaa : Dreams of our Fathers shortlisted for Magnum Foundation prize & nominated for Prix Pictet 2019 (Arts Council England funded)
Supnaa : Dreams of our Fathers is a project of BCVA Director Anand Chhabra’s long term project on his parents migration to the Black Country. The project therefore connects to his parents generation of migrants who had hopes of a better life in another part of the Commonwealth. From 228 applications from 58 countries this project was shortlisted down to the final few by Magnum Foundation’s Photography in Collaboration : Migration & Religion prize. The project seek to communicate the truth of those formative years through portraits, ephemera and conceptual images when Punjabi’s arrived into the Black Country en masse in a very tumultuous time in the 1960s and relays there hopes, dreams as well as disappointments. The 60’s was a racially charged time with a generation that knew the horrors of partition back home and racial prejudice as sojourners abroad. This project seeks to look at the times nd seasons of their lives as a story that remains largely untold through fine art documentary photography. The project has also nominated for Prix Pictet in 2019.
Working with two new community groups for Apna Heritage Archive
BCVA has started working with two new community groups from All Saints and Blakenhall on the Apna Heritage Archive project. We took along some of our archive prints to showcase the collection so far and introduced the project to the ladies. A keen interest was shown by both groups and we look forward to further visits and hopefully more photographs for the archive!
Apna Heritage Archive at Tiranga 2016
BCVA attended Jaivant Patel Dance's Tiranga 2016 event at the heart of the community in Blakenhall Wolverhampton. It was a great opportunity to promote the Apna Heritage Archive to our target audience and participants. We had a positive response from the local community and met many new participants for the archive project.
BCVA would like to thank Jaivant Patel and all the staff at Tiranga 2016 for their support.
St Luke's visit to Wolverhampton City Archives
A group of 30 children visited Wolverhampton City Archives as part of BCVA's Apna Heritage Archive project. The children learned about the value of archives and the history of the Molineux Hotel building. Along with a visit to the strong rooms and taking photographs of the buildings architecture conservator Jon Everall and City Archivist Heidi McIntosh shared their knowledge with the children and staff. A big thank you to all the staff at Wolverhampton City Archives for an exciting and historical afternoon!
Pupils at St Luke's primary school learn the value of archives
BCVA once again teamed up with St Luke's C of E primary school in Blakenhall to talk about our new Apna Heritage Archive project. Over the course of 4 workshops they will learn about the value of archives and how to create their very own archive made up of portraits and information about themselves. The children learned how to take a portrait through a practical game of 'human camera' and portrait session. Over the next few workshops we will visit the Wolverhampton City Archives to learn more about archival practice and take new portraits in national dress. A big thank you to all the staff and children for their hard work and enthusiasm for the project. Apna Heritage Archive is funded by Heritage Lottery Fund.
Desi Pubs makes it to Alchemy 2016 at the Southbank Center
Creative Black Country's commissioned work by six artists at six Black Country pubs opens at the Southbank Alchemy festival 2016. The opening night was a huge success with a coach full of Desi Pub landlords and Artist arriving at the Royal Festival Hall in style! The Alchemy festival showcases the talents of Artists from around the world, celebrating the rich cultural relationship between the Indian subcontinent and the UK. Artists at BCVA displayed 18 portraits taken at The Island Inn and The Sportsman Club both in West Bromwich.
Apna Heritage Archive Instagram post leads to tweets by two Wolverhampton born writers!
A post on Twitter by Wolverhampton born journalist Sathnam Sanghera " Lovely new Instagram account aiming to collate some British Asian history" was followed by a re tweet by fellow Wolverhampton born comedian and writer Mera Syal " These old b/w snaps make everything look like a movie still. Cherish and share, photos on a phone just can't compete."
'Desi Pubs' BCVA interview with Cyrus Todiwala by BBC's Ruchi Tandon
Cyrus Todiwala was in the Black Country today visiting the 'Desi Pubs' project and meeting some of the artists that are creating new work at the pubs. Anand and Sra talked with Cyrus and Ruchi about their portrait work and the interesting stories behind them. It was great to hear Cyrus's take on the 'Desi Pub' story here in the Black Country.
Over the last few months Anand and Sra have created new portraits at the Island Inn and The Sportsman Club, both in West Bromwich as part of a Creative Black Country commission.
'Apna Heritage Archive' Black Country Visual Arts CIC wins Heritage Lottery Fund support
Black Country Visual Arts CIC has received £68,600 from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) for an exciting project, Apna Heritage Archive, in Wolverhampton. Led by Black Country Visual Arts and supported by a range of local partners and volunteers, the project will create an original photographic archive of Punjabi migration to the city from 1960 to 1989. The Apna Heritage archive will exist within Guru Teg Bahadur Gurdwara in Blakenhall with a digital copy available at the City Archives. The project will run for two years until early 2018.
Thanks to National Lottery players the project will engage Punjabi residents of Wolverhampton to learn about and discuss their heritage contributing their historic family photographs to the new archive. Seventy-five portraits will also be taken providing a present day record. Community volunteers will learn about the value of heritage and develop skills to create and maintain the visual archive. A creative learning and heritage project with St Luke’s Primary School will run alongside the project. Year 6 school children will learn and develop heritage research skills and create their own archive of the school and local Blakenhall community.
The BCVA project partnership includes: Guru Teg Bahadur Gurdwara, St Luke’s Primary School, Wolverhampton Art Gallery, Wolverhampton City Archives and the University of Wolverhampton.
BCVA & Exodus project make headlines in Express & Star 'Art Tribute'
Black Country Visual Arts ground breaking arts project makes headlines in local press. The double page article highlights the importance of the project within the community and goes on to interview some of the participants. This was an opportunity for them to tell their stories first hand. Award winning author Sathnam Sanghera said he was pleased to see that Black Country Visual Arts was attempting to tell migrants stories through its Exodus project.
Exhibition at Bantock House Museum 13th Oct - 12th Nov 2015
As part of Black Country Visual Arts artists Anand Chhabra and Sarvjit Sra have worked closely with first generation migrants of South Asian origin in Wolverhampton. They have created a collection of photographs by carefully selecting and scanning the personal albums of 17 families.
Within the main gallery space (ground floor) the artists have on display 12 recent portraits of migrants that arrived in the 1960’s. The participants are holding some of the earliest images of themselves along with descendants holding images commemorating family members who have passed on since arrival.
The Community Gallery (first floor) houses the collection of scanned black and white images that represent the communities that we have reached as part of our research. The images show a community at social and cultural events in those early days.
Through this method of scanning and taking new photographic portraits the aim of the artists has been to tell a story of what people looked like then and now. We have set out our exhibition to create an imprint on our audience about a group of migrants who put down roots, integrated with life, work and play around them, making a lasting impact to the city.
Going forward our aim is to create an installation called ‘Arrivals Hall’ which will consist of a life size airport luggage conveyor belt carrying the black and white images. This will be a touring installation with an actual rotating conveyor belt with printed images. The moving belt signifies the arrival and onward movement of a people. The installation will include a separate series of current portraits of the participants.
We would like to thank the following for their support during our research: Arts Council England, Multistory, Wolverhampton City Archives, Bantock House Museum, BM Autoparts, Humjoli Ladies Group (Dunstall), Kaleidoscope Group (Pennfields), St Chads Ladies Group (Cherry St), Park Village Ladies Group (Park Village).