Location 29
The Sea is Big
For Refugee Week 2022, we took a different approach to this exhibition, working with children from eight local junior schools who are members of the Birmingham City of Sanctuary project.
We commissioned a local woodturner to make 230 skittles which were distributed to 8 junior schools. The children in these schools were asked to decorate them with their interpretation of refugees and what the word meant to them. The skittles were then displayed on a “raft” suspended from the ceiling of the gallery. The raft moved when visitors touched it causing them to have to pick up and replace fallen skittles – a metaphor for helping refugees and asylum seekers.
There was an incredibly moving poem written by the cousin of a refugee who lost their life crossing the Mediterranean. We also highlighted an organisation called Stories from Hope and Home, which is a story-telling platform offering Asylum Seekers and Refugees a space to share their stories and others a space to hear them. Egyptian artist, Marwa Sayed, decorated oars with extracts from these stories which were then hung from the ceiling.
