Freedom Festival: New partnership with Imperial War Museum
Picture credit: ‘Tomorrow – Freedom Woman Collective’
By Simon Bristow
Freedom Festival Arts Trust has announced a new partnership with the Imperial War Museum in London, which will fund a new exhibition by the Freedom Women Collective to be shown in Hull later this year.
The exhibition is currently being developed and will form part of this year’s Freedom Festival, held from August 30 to September 3.
The commission is through the IWM 14-18 NOW Legacy Fund, a national partnership programme of over 20 artist commissions inspired by the heritage of conflict.
The trust, which called the partnership “incredibly exciting”, is one of nine new partners announced today by Imperial War Museums through the fund, which was created following the success of 14-18 NOW, the official UK arts programme for the First World War centenary.
The nine new art commissions tackle subjects ranging from rebuilding after the Second World War to reconciliation in the aftermath of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Each receive £20,000 from Imperial War Museums’ (IWM) art commissioning programme, funded with a share of the royalties from Peter Jackson’s critically acclaimed film They Shall Not Grow Old.
The nine organisations are members of IWM’s War and Conflict Subject Specialist Network (WCSSN) and hail from across all four nations of the UK. The new commissions take various forms including original brass band compositions, large scale street art and film installations.
Freedom Festival Arts Trust is working with the Freedom Women Collective, a group of women who have survived war, conflict and persecution, to tell their stories through a multi-artform exhibition, weaving stories from Ethiopia, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Sudan using visual and textile art, sculpture, performance, poetry, and photography.
Rebecca Newell, Head of Art for Imperial War Museums, said: “The IWM 14-18 NOW Legacy fund builds on Imperial War Museums’ rich and longstanding history of commissioning art. One year into this programme, we are delighted by the diversity of exceptional arts experiences that have been created and shared with audiences.
“We look forward to expanding this work with artists, organisations and communities across the UK, continuing to highlight stories of conflict in engaging and creative ways.”
The Freedom Women Collective said: “This commission gives us the space and opportunity to reflect on our tomorrows, how we faced them, how we dealt with them and why tomorrow is precious. These pieces continue our ongoing support of artists who explore their experiences of displacement, giving space to represent themselves to shine light on misrepresentation of refugees’ lives and experiences. It is incredibly important.”
Freedom Festival Arts Trust is a charity which also delivers outstanding annual international arts festivals Freedom Festival and The Awakening.
More information on the Freedom Festival 2023 programme is available here. You can find out more about the IWM 14-18 NOW Legacy Fund here.