Buy a coffee, listen in and contribute your own questions and stories to this ‘research-in-public’ event that will contribute towards the making of the final performance.
Join theatremaker and artistic director of METIS arts projects Zoë Svendsen, who will be interviewing specialists about questions of refuge, migration and the ways people get caught up in (increasingly unaccountable) bureaucratic systems, as part of the creative development of Transit (working title), an environmentally immersive app-based performance.
Cath Senker, Luqma Onikosi, Jacob Berkman and Cindy Hawkins Rada will join Zoë to explore trouble and how to hold onto hope in the current migration context, before opening out for a wider discussion.
The Avenue is an inclusive café with disabled access in Kemptown. Come buy a coffee/tea and join us for the conversation.
Spaces limited to 25 people, please arrive early to ensure a space.
About the speakers
Luqma Onikosi: activist, community organiser and researcher. Luqma Onikosi is writing a PhD on political economy of development at Brighton University. He has drawn on his lived experience of being caught in limbo in the UK’s immigration system to setup a range of projects to enable migrants to come together and exchange experiences and information for navigating immigration bureaucracy through mutual support networks. This includes the Sussex Refugee and Migrant Self-support Group, which runs the Jollof Café, a project run by migrants where people are invited to cook food of their country of origin, bringing together settled and migrant communities in solidarity. Luqma also co-founded Thousand 4 1000, a charity that supports migrants at risk of homelessness.
Jacob Berkson: activist and co-founder/member of the leadership team for Brighton-based charity www.thousand4thousand.org.uk. The long summer of migration in 2015 coincided with Jacob finishing a PhD in philosophy. Along with friends, he founded Thousand 4 1000, a housing project aiming to support people on the move to re-establish their lives in Brighton by crowdfunding rent through recurring micro-donations. 10 years on from acquiring their first house, the charity now provides homes and thousands of nights of accommodation every year. Although the project was part of a failed attempt to make permanent the rupture in Europe's border made by people during that extraordinary summer, it remains an embodiment of solidarity and hospitality. Jacob is still involved in the day-to-day running of the charity, providing advice, care and support. He is also retraining as a lawyer
Cindy Hawkins Rada: advisor for Racial Justice, Amnesty International. I am a Raizal feminist woman. I hold a Bachelor of Laws degree from Colombia, a Master of Laws in International Law from the University of Georgia (awarded through a Fulbright Scholarship for Afro-Colombian leaders), and a Master of Science in Migration Studies from the University of Oxford. My work focuses on systemic racism in migration and asylum contexts from an international human rights perspective, as well as how laws governing mobility contribute to racialized identity formation. I am currently a researcher and adviser on racial justice at Amnesty International, participating in this event in a personal capacity.
Cath Senker: is a non-fiction author, teacher and activist. She's the co-author of Brighton Bound: Stories of moving to, around and out of the city, 1920s–2020s (Queen Spark Books, 2024), which explores LGBTQ+ migration and refuge in Brighton. Cath has written several titles for children on migration and refugees, including What Can We Do? Migration (Franklin Watts, 2024). As well as teaching at the University of Sussex, she teaches English to refugees at Migrant English Project and co-facilitates the Story Tree reading group for refugees at Jubilee Library, Brighton
About Zoë Svendsen
Zoë Svendsen (zoë/her): director, dramaturg, writer, researcher making participatory theatre performances and installations exploring ecological crisis and capitalism, including: Ness, a digital/sonic immersive landscape performance adapted from the poem by Robert Macfarlane (HighTide/Metal Culture); Wild Dress by Kate Fletcher(Hawkwood Centre for Future Thinking); Love Letters to a Liveable Future (Cambridge Junction); video installation Factory of the Future (Oslo ArchitectureTriennale); Artsadmin Green Commission, WE KNOW NOT WHAT WE MAYBE (Barbican); Tipping Point commission, 3rd Ring Out. Zoë is Associate Artist at Cambridge Junction and lectures on dramaturgy and performance at the University of Cambridge, undertaking practice-led research. Through Artistic Associateships with HighTide and the Donmar Warehouse, Zoë developed the concept/ethos of climate dramaturgy, running workshops nationally/internationally. Zoë is a founding member of the pan-European network, the Naked Theatre.
Zoë has previously run café conversations for the following projects:
- World Factory (YoungVic, New Wolsey Ipswich & others)
- WE KNOW NOT WHAT WE MAY BE (Barbican)
- Factory of the Future (Oslo Architecture Triennale)
- Love Letters for a Liveable Future (Cambridge Junction)
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