Hello again,

I wish I could say the world had taken a turn for the better in the two or so years since I last posted on here. But it hasn’t has it…

As I write we’re teetering on the edge of who knows what in Brexit-land, news of a fresh atrocity perpetrated by white, far right terrorists comes from around the world, and more hate and division continues to be spoken from our politicians, our media, our screens.

What can we do?

One thing (but by no means the only thing) we’re doing is going back to the wise words and strong examples of the Black women leaders in history. One such woman was Shirley Chisholm, first Black congresswoman and the first woman to run for the Presidential nomination of the Democratic party. If you’ve not read her autobiography ‘Unbought and Unbossed‘ I strongly recommend it. Every word stands out as a clear-sighted judgement of the corrupted political system and embedded racism and sexism of politics, the consequences of which as so evident today. The world would be better if we had listened to Black Women.

We’ve commissioned Zodwa Nyoni, writer of Nine Lives, and Testament to start work on a new piece about Shirley Chisholm. It’s very early days but we’re excited about where this is going. Testament has been awarded an Opera North Resonance residency to do some work on it and we’ll be doing a small work in progress sharing in Leeds on 5th April. If you want to come along drop me an email on alex@leedsstudio.org