Difference Festival, February 25th to March 1st 2019

There are a whole host of fantastic events organised by IMCC members and affiliates that are happening as part of the Difference festival at the University of Westminster, focusing this year on the idea of the ‘radical’.

Monday 25th February, 6.00 -8.00 pm
Regent Street Cinema

Hold me like before: radical trans representation on film

Join us for a screening of this independent Costa Rican film Hold Me Like Before (Abrázame Como Antès, 2016; in Spanish with English subtitles). Taking place at the historic Regent Street Cinema, the documentary-style film is followed by a Skype Q&A with director Jurgen Ureña and a panel discussion on transgender representation on film and on the radical way the director went about the filmmaking process. Led by Liz Harvey-Katou, Senior Lecturer in Spanish Language and Culture, with Margherita Sprio, Reader in Film and Visual Culture.

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Tuesday 26th February, 12.30 – 2.00 pm
Foyer, University of Westminster, 309 Regent Street

Picpoetry radical jam

Discover the visual poet in you with picpoet’s radical way of seeing and feeling the world around you through role-play. Take a walk around the university, discover unexplored angles and new ways of thinking and being. Radicalise the ‘Lawscape’ by exploring how norms allow us to move in certain ways and impede us in others. Take quick pictures and write instant texts that capture your own position with regards to what you see. With an opportunity to win modest but fun prizes. Led by Law and Theory Professor Andreas Philippopoulos-Mihalopoulos, the picpoet.

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Wednesday 27th and Thursday 28th February, 12.30 – 2.00 pm
Old Gym and Foyer, University of Westminster, 309 Regent Street

Banner up! a radical take-over

As you walk through into our Regent Street entrance, drop by and become an activist in our two-day ‘take-over’ using our workshops and activity stations set up there. Make a cartoon or a political placard in our workshops, or your own badge at our activity station. Your creation will feature in our installation of placards and banners to celebrating this year’s Difference Festival radical theme. Led by students and alumni of our MA Museums, Galleries and Contemporary Culture with the Cartoon Museum and Peter Ride, Principal Research Fellow, School of Humanities and IMCC.

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Wednesday 27th February, 12.00 – 1.00 pm
Soho Poly Theatre Basement (meet in Foyer), University of Westminster, 4-12 Little Titchfield Street

Radical voices: poetry matters   

Drawing on previous radical Soho Poly Project experiments disrupting time and space with our lunchtime theatre, found sounds and ghost gigs projects, we return to Poetry Matters and the history of poetry at the Polytechnic offering two radical takes. First, Mike Garry, Writer in Residence at Westminster Law School, offers his own radical take on poetry. Second, we offer a further radical take, again disrupting time and space and streaming this lunchtime performance live. Expect surprises. Organised by Guy Osborn, Professor of Law and Matt Morrison, Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing, working with Anna McNally, Senior Archivist.

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Wednesday 27th February, 1.30 – 3.00 pm
Soho Poly Theatre Basement (meet in Foyer), University of Westminster, 4-12 Little Titchfield Street

The radical in popular culture: alternative theatre in Westminster, a virtual tour

Take a virtual visit of sites and venues in the borough of Westminster to discover why it became a centre of innovative theatre. Tour includes: Inter-Action’s Ambiance lunchtime theatre club in Queensway, their staging of Britain’s first Black Theatre and their time at the Almost Free Theatre in Rupert Street, scene of Britain’s first women’s theatre season in 1974 and first gay theatre season in 1975; the ground-breaking Soho Poly (later the Soho Theatre); the ILEA’s Cockpit Theatre; and the ICA’s controversial socialist theatre season. Find out also about the Cartoon Archetypal Slogan Theatre (CAST), and writing initiatives such as Foco Novo and Joint Stock. Led by our guest Susan Croft, playwright, historian and curator, and Unfinished Histories; organised by Guy Osborn and Matt Morrison, with Anna McNally.

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Wednesday 27th February, 6.00 – 9.00 pm
Fyvie Hall, University of Westminster, 309 Regent Street

Radical film: voyeurism in documentary filmmaking on migration

Together with a screening, we invite you to sit at our Long Table and take part in discussions with filmmakers, protagonists, curators and activists sharing their work and radical strategies to resist voyeurism in film-making on forced migration. Explore our positions as storytellers, curators and media consumers, think about the responsibilities of those who create visual narratives based on another’s experience and engage with some of those to whom these stories belong. Everyone is welcome to take a seat at the Long Table, breaking down hierarchies of ‘spectator’ and ‘expert’; come and go between table and audience and help the conversation outside on leaving the table. Led by Alternative Fictions, a collective of visual anthropologists and documentary makers, and Migration Collective; organised by Federica Mazzara, Senior Lecturer in Intercultural Communication, and Lily Parrot, School of Law and co-founder of Migration Collective.

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Thursday 28th February, 6.00 – 8.00 pm
UG04, University of Westminster, 309 Regent Street

Radical curation: race, memory and activism in heritage practice

Join us as we bring together activists, heritage professionals and academics developing new strategies to counter the naturalisation of racial injustice. This roundtable and Q&A examine the challenges of representing and commemorating black and minority histories. Together, we explore ways to bring marginalised pasts to public attention and make hidden histories visible. Followed by a drinks reception. Led by Lucy Bond, Lecturer in English Literature, School of Humanities and IMCC, and Jessica Rapson, Lecturer in Cultural and Creative Industries, King’s College London, with activists and heritage professionals from Tate, Museum of London, Black Cultural Archives, Black History Walks and the Organisation of Women of African and Asian Descent (OWAAD).

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