BELONGINGS
BELONGINGS is a new exhibition and events programme that challenges anti-asylum narratives and creates pathways to belonging with people seeking sanctuary. It centres an exhibition by renowned artist Susan Aldworth featuring the imagined contents of the suitcase her grandmother brought with her when she was migrating from Northern Italy to London in 1924. Thirty-five individual antique clothes, including a nightgown that was in the original suitcase, are hand-embroidered with family photographs, stories and recipes. Suspended in mid-air, they highlight the transitory and emotional nature of an uprooted life.
The exhibition invites visitors to reflect on: what might we learn from history about migration, sanctuary seeking, and belonging? How does it feel to leave your home forever? What does it mean to belong in the current moment, for people seeking sanctuary in the UK?
With global forced displacement at a record high, BELONGINGS is important and timely. In the UK, despite a rich history of positive migration impacts, policies have made it sometimes difficult for people who are seeking sanctuary to feel that they belong due to increasing experiences of racism and discrimination. BELONGINGS seeks to create inclusive spaces for mutual learning and working so that all may feel that they belong and can make a place for themselves.
A creative and thought-provoking activities programme accompanies the exhibition. It includes Hassan Akkad’s latest film Matar, an embroidery workshop, a public engagement workshop and talks that discuss displacement and belonging from different experiential and disciplinary perspectives.
The programme is organised by Prof Hanna Kienzler, from King’s Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, in collaboration with artist Susan Aldworth, Prof Cornelius Katona, Dr Leonie Ansems de Vries, Dr Guntars Ermansons, and A&M Consultancy. It forms part of a new season from King’s Culture, Lost and Found: Stories of sanctuary and belonging. The programme builds on work by members of the Refugee Mental Health and Place Network at King’s and it is supported by the ESRC Centre for Society and Mental Health.