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Transcript

Free Word Lecture with Misan Harriman | Bradford Literature Festival 2026 · explore words discover worlds

• 0:07
  SPEAKER_02: Um hello.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_02: Hello.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_02: I was I was pretty worried because um they've been changing the times of the football match and it was supposed to be at 7 p.m.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_02: I thought, okay, I'm gonna be talking with one very keen fan.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_02: So they they switched it back to 2 a.m., which is better for everyone in this room, I would hope.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um I wanted before even so you know, I'm gonna talk about my life story and and how I became a visual storyteller and why that matters in these perilous times, but also hopeful times that we're living through.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_02: But before that, I wanted to say this.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_02: I've I just checked on my phone, and one major British newspaper has at least written an article in the last few hours about Dr.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_02: Hussam Abu Safir and the the independent.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_02: And I cannot begin to speak without saying that if you have anything like a voice, which you all do, then speak for him.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_02: You know, director of the Kamal Adwan Hospital in the north of Gaza, who is, from what I've heard, in critical condition.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_02: Hopefully the BBC and others will follow the independent lead and make sure that this man lives.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_02: So, like many in this room, uh I am a child of empire.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_02: And what I mean by that is through no choices of my parents and their parents, I was my both my parents were born into an occupied Nigeria.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_02: And our social programming has been so efficient that most Nigerians don't use the word occupied.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_02: They say, Oh, we were a British colony.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_02: No, we were occupied.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_02: Nigeria was named by an English lady called Flora Shaw Ni Lugard.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_02: She later married Lord Frederick Lugard, who was the head of the protectorate.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_02: Protectorate, an interesting word.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_02: You occupy and then you protect.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_02: Over 300 tribes forced to be one nation, separated through religious grounds and natural resources.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_02: It probably sounds familiar to a lot of other countries.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_02: I was sent, I was born in Nigeria and sent to boarding school in the 80s.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_02: That's an important point.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_02: In the schooling system, the private schooling system that's really designed to create the next leaders of the same colonial pillars that uphold so much of the power in this nation and beyond.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_02: I always describe it as Harry Potter without any magic.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_02: It was a pretty tricky and confusing time for me.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_02: But I found safety and solace in the pages of books, in the sweet territory of song and music, going to the video club and watching movies, and then imagery, imagery, imagery.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_02: And I remember finding a photo book with this image.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_02: And it changed my life.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_02: Because before that, photographs were holiday snaps, movie posters, and I saw this woman that could could be my mother.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_02: That's Coretta Scott King.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_02: At the funeral of her husband, Martin Luther King, with her baby girl, Benice, in her lap.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_02: And somehow this woman is still looking graceful, still looking strong on what would have been one of the hardest days of her life.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_02: Do you know that even in the death of her husband, they said that she couldn't have any black photographers at her husband's funeral?
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_02: She said, no one's coming into this place, if that's the case.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_02: And Monita Sleet Jr.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_02: took this picture, a black African-American photographer, and he became the first black man to win the Pulitzer for photography.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_02: This image taught me what could lie between the highlights and shadows of monochrome, which is our collective truth, our need to have a mirror to look at ourselves through the lived experiences of others, so we can carve out a better world for all.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_02: I am what you call neurospicy.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_02: I didn't really do well at school.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_02: I can barely spell my name today.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_02: I miss out every other word, exams were a nightmare.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_02: And in the 80s, even at a very fancy school, there was no understanding of me.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_02: I remember having to read my report to my father, and I remember I stood there and I was like, oh, we believe your yes, your son Miss An has, this is the words they use, um, mild retardation.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_02: And that was tricky for a little boy who was already confused and scared of the world that seemed too big, too many inputs for him to deal with.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_02: So for a big part of my formative years, I was ashamed of my mind.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_02: Truly ashamed of it.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_02: And much later in life, I met my now wife.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_02: And she fell in love with all the parts of myself that I was ashamed of.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_02: It was her that said, all you bloody talk about of films and photos, why are you so scared of having a point of view?
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_02: I know you know a lot about other filmmakers, other photographers, but I'm gonna get you a camera.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_02: So we went to um to India, to Rajasthan, beautiful part of the world.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_02: And she had bought me a camera, and we were pregnant with our first child, and I took a whole bunch of crap photos of a very beautiful part of the world.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_02: But the thing about uh this kind of new world for someone like me who would have struggled in a traditional photo school is that I realized that there were men and women who had made YouTube videos of all the questions that I needed to ask.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_02: How does ISO work?
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_02: How does shutter speed work?
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_02: What is an F-stop?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_02: And I learned really quickly.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_02: I also I became the photographer that I am today by failing, failing, failing, and failing.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_02: Shortly after we became parents, a man that looks like me, called George Floyd, was lying in his own piss, begging for his mama, while still calling the men with their knees on his neck, sir, as he left this mortal coil.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_02: And I remember looking to my wife again saying, I don't have any more tears.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_02: And she was like, Look to your camera.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_02: I was like, and do what?
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_02: She goes, look to your camera.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_02: And I remember taking the train to London, going to Hyde Park for my first sort of protest after George Floyd was lynched, not knowing if there'll be five or five thousand people there.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_02: And the people came.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_02: All walks of life, all races, all religions, and I started taking photographs.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_02: It's my clicker alive?
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_02: It's not clicking.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_02: I think it's on.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_02: And I'll continue talking.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_02: Someone probably come and fix it.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_02: Ah, there we are.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um and the images I took, it was it was it was really strange because I was photographing my own trauma.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_02: So this image here has become one of the most shared, it's been seen by over a billion people.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_02: Um, one of the most shared civil rights images of the digital age.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_02: And I've become family with Darcy.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_02: She's a field hockey player for England.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_02: And she had a disagreement with friends and family about whether she should go.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_02: And she decided to go, and you can see the paint is still drying on the sign.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_02: And if she had taken a different train, if I had been looking in a different direction, this is a nine elms lane outside the US Embassy.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_02: We would never have met each other on the street.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_02: And of course, as I pressed the shutter, someone threw their fists in the air.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_02: And the rest, as they say, really is history.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_02: Martin Luther King's son, this the son of the woman I just showed you, saw this image, didn't know who I was, didn't even know it was taken in England, and was so moved that he shared it.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_02: And then all those celebritons started sharing it, and um my life, I would say, really did change forever because of this image.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_02: This is in Guildford.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_02: Small protests, really moving protests, because there's something about our youth, and God, I swear by this, they've never been on the wrong side of history, our young people.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_02: We should respect and learn from them.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_02: And this young woman, as a black man, I always hear black lives matter, black lives matter, but I had never seen a sign like this before saying matter is a minimum.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_02: That we are worthy, beloved, and needed.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_02: Once again, a young mind wrote that.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_02: That's not her professor or father or mother, that's what she feels.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_02: And I don't know about you, but we could listen to those words and take heed of them.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_02: And I went on this journey, photographing all around London.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_02: You fucked with the last generation.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_02: It's an interesting image.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_02: The way he's staring, that's on Parliament Square.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_02: And I remember just thinking, I've never experienced this before.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_02: So many people that are so sure that we can have an alternative to what the status quo is.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_02: This image broke me.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_02: It broke me.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_02: I was in my editing suite and just looking through the images, and it was a tough day.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_02: It's hard to take these pictures.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_02: This is all in 2020.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_02: And to see this young man in, you know, this is just after lockdown, and God knows he has his own challenges in the wheelchair with his mother, and there's spots of rain falling down, a sea of fists behind him.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_02: And I and I looked at this image and I was like, my God, if this isn't hope, I don't know what hope would be.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_02: He's coming out for the dignity of people that look like me with the challenges that he has.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, I want to be part of the community that this mother and young man are proud to build.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes you can take an image and not realize what you've taken.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_02: So I saw those eyes, and I saw my eyes.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_02: I saw shared trauma.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_02: I saw the invisible handshake of the decisive moment of taking a picture.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_02: It wasn't again till I looked at the image properly, and I was like, Because there's someone behind this man holding a sign.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_02: You can barely see most of it, but there are two lines you can see.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_02: I am not a moment, but can you see us now?
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_02: I sometimes think certain images choose you.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_02: My mental health.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_02: I you know, I I I was having a particularly low day, it was a big protest, and I was I was gonna go home, and I remember just double taking, and I just saw these ocean blue eyes, but little, little head, and I was like, no.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_02: And I walk up to this man, and we've become friends now, his name's Roger, and I was like, what the f are you doing?
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_02: And he's like, I believe in the osmosis effect of protest, and she may not remember, her name's Juno, and she may not remember, but something from this day will be part of her.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_02: And I was holding back tears.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_02: Woof.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_02: And in my um exhibition, which is still ongoing, he came with Juno, who's this high now.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_02: And and again, she's part of this legacy that many of us are really trying to build.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_02: I laugh because my first professional gig as a photographer was one of the most important uh uh I guess fashion shoots in this in this country.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_02: I'll never forget when I got the Zoom call and lots of different heads popped up, you know, from Vogue.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_02: I thought, oh.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_02: And then Edward Eningfall said, Oh, Miss Ann, we're giving you the cover, and I was like, the cover?
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_02: I had no idea what was going on.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_02: And he goes, Yeah, you've got September.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_02: And I remember taking the train to Manchester to Marcus Rashford's house, and him being really nervous, and he was doing keepy opies with his mates to feel a little we were all nervous, but we also knew that if we nailed this, it could be something really, really important in that moment six years ago.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_02: And it's really rare to have a black and white cover of any fashion magazine.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_02: It's really rare to have a man, uh, and it's even more rare to have a black man, and then to have this extraordinary black woman, Adwa, who who is a model and activist, it was just you couldn't do this cover today.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and um, it changed my life, and suddenly people knew uh of me and my work, and other phone calls happened.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_02: And with Lewis, it was interesting because I was asked to photograph him, um, but we're both dyslexic, so there was you know a potential real connection.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_02: So they also asked me to interview him.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_02: So I interviewed him and shot him for GQ Man of the Year, and he was so gentle and and and listened intently to everything um that I was talking about and spoke about how he was bullied a lot.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_02: He was small, and his father will say, You do your fighting on the track.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_02: They would take spare parts of other go-karts to get theirs built.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_02: And look, look at what he's done with his life.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_02: And he's donated a lot of money to all the things that we all care about.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_02: Another woman with a big heart, you know, Angelina Jolie.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_02: I remember when um we were waiting for her, and um I was like, Oh, I'd love to have her go up on the roof.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_02: They're like, no, no, no roof.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_02: And she arrived, and I was like, hello.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_02: She goes, call me Angie.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I was like, I would love, you know, I love natural light.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_02: She goes, of course.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_02: And literally, as we we go up onto the roof, it was like a gray London day.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_02: As this woman stepped onto the roof, the clouds just parted, and this golden light shone upon her.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_02: And um, she's she's a woman of of deep moral clarity.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_02: She's been you know insulted and harassed by her own father because of her stance for Palestine.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_02: And she still speaks, and as you saw earlier in the year, she went to Jordan to continue the work.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_02: And then I get a phone call from a head hunter saying, we're considering you know the new chair for South Bank Center, and of course I laughed saying, you know, are you for real?
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_02: And and um then I started thinking about how much time I spent there, how much I love the fact that it was one of the most inclusive spaces we have for art and culture.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_02: And a long interview process later, I became again the first black chair of this country's largest cultural institution, set up just after we were licking our wounds from war 75 years ago.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_02: The great village hall, 40% of our programming is still free.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_02: Everything from the skate park to the classical music inside to hosting the BAFTAs, but more really a space where it doesn't matter who you are, you don't reduce yourself in South Bank.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_02: It isn't a golden, gilded palace where things cost so much.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_02: It's a place for you to discover who you are, who you could be, and belong.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm deeply proud of my association of such an institution.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_02: My wife's like, you really like movies?
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_02: I was like, I do.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_02: And she's like, that is the thing that you haven't really been sure enough to try.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_02: So I came up with this story, found a good script writer, and we pitched Netflix.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_02: Netflix somehow said yes to a story about grief and masculinity called The After.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_02: I had no idea, and there's nowhere to hide, by the way, when you make a film, right, where it would go.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_02: And it did end up being nominated for an Oscar.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_02: It it is um something I'm deeply proud of.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_02: I remember DMing David O'Yellow, or big actor, thinking, well, he's not gonna respond.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_02: And he responded saying, Oh, I love your pictures, let's make a movie together.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_02: So DMs can work.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_02: Don't be shy.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_02: And as all of these things were happening, I guess I could have stayed on red carpets or fancy yachts and can film festival photographing very famous people.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_02: But as I as I said at the beginning of this, I'm a child of empire.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_02: And there's something in my bones that I I just can't let go of when I see injustice happening to people who haven't won the lottery of life.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_02: So when Save the Children asked me to become the ambassador, I've been working, you know, with them quietly, but they're like, we would love you to step up.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_02: And it was and still is a great honor.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_02: I uh went pretty quickly to Somalia to document what's happening in the Horn of Africa.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_02: The images I took, I was I remember being so excited because I had these images, I had a good understanding of what you could do to make sure famine doesn't come and and and and have children perish.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_02: And I get back to England and I have lots of contacts in the press, and I called a senior contact, and he goes, mate, you're a friend of mine, if you are coming back from Ukraine, I would run this story.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_02: He said it to my face.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_02: I got one, I think the FT ran a story off my trip, and no one else did.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_02: Trying to humanize these mothers that walk miles and have to learn how to keep their children alive under unimaginable circumstances.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_02: Because of the war in Ukraine, so much of the wheat, many people don't know this, Ukraine feeds a lot of East Africa.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_02: And when that stopped exponentially, the price of food goods in the market went up and it makes it even harder to survive.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_02: Which is why it's so important when our press decides whose humanity matters for all of you to be their voice.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_02: Whether it's on your WhatsApp group, whether it's arguing with your friends or colleagues, humanize these people.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_02: Humanize them.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_02: And speaking of humanizing, after October 7th, I did actually even before, before October 7th, I was shooting Palestine protests because I photograph all protests.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_02: This image on the embankment is of two men who, again, we have been told that they're supposed to hate each other.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_02: And I've seen them in almost every protest, and they're always there.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_02: And I just think it's such a powerful rebuke of algorithms and bad actors trying to keep us on islands of rage.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_02: If you lean into the community you're told to hate, you will only see humanity.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_02: Lean into that.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_02: It really, really matters.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_02: I photographed the Jewish bloc and anti-Zionist Jews and a full broad spectrum of Arab, Muslim, South Asian, black, progressive humans, and of course white English folk in the pro Palestine movement.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_02: And I noticed something really strange.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_02: Every time I posted an image of the Jewish bloc.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: I would within 30 seconds get bots.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm used to bots, but these bots said a very specific thing.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_02: They said, AI.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_02: This is not real.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_02: Both on my Facebook and Instagram within 30 seconds.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_02: And I found that really interesting.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_02: And I've tried again to speak to a lot of my friends in the press.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_02: I have thousands of images of this community, and none of them want to run it.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_02: The same people that were running my Black Lives That Matter images, my Ukraine images, because I photographed everything.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_02: Women's rights images, the queer and trans, they don't, these people do not want this group of people to be amplified, which I think is very, very interesting.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_02: So I share it on my social media.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_02: Because it's important when Suele Brahman coined the term hate march, and I was seeing a coalition of kind people that worship different gods, that love differently, that look differently, saying, for God's sake, there must be a better solution than bombs.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_02: And I don't think that equates to hate.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_02: How when decisions of primal violence are made, it's usually men in the room.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_02: But I have to say, in these protests, I've seen beautiful men, beautiful fathers raising their kids as best they can, unsure of what the future is bringing, but having them want to understand what it means to be in community and to lift others into the same place as them.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm really proud that these images exist in the age of Andrew Tate and Tommy Robinson.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_02: A gentle, kind man is not a sign of weakness, and we must amplify that as best we can.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_02: I've also photographed a lot of specific protests on the murder of journalists.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_02: Something that means a lot to me.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm asked El Sharif, there are many, there are many, many, but their names are forgotten.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_02: Documenting usually the annihilation of their own people, sometime burying their own family.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_02: And it's just really important for you to understand that more journalists have been killed in Gaza than any recorded modern warfare.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_02: And we have not had walkouts from Sky News, Channel 4, the BBC.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_02: We haven't had them say these are our people.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_02: You can't call them all terrorists.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_02: And the crime cannot be truth itself.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_02: Because that must never be the crime, otherwise, we will arrive in the place that all well warned us to reject what we see and hear with our own eyes.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_02: The tear, the tear.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_02: These two images you're about to see are a reminder of how so many of us are deeply changed in the last three years.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_02: We will never be the same.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_02: And this woman, it was the pots and pans outside Downing Street and the tear going down her.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_02: I felt like I was standing within her own soul because I know what that means.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_02: I locked myself away a couple of times a week in my toilet so my girls don't see me weep.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_02: I know what that tear is.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_02: And it's a sign of humanity.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_02: What I can't get over are people that are still going to play golf on the weekends and planning Halloween costumes.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_02: When the equivalent of six Hiroshimas has been dropped in a place with a million children, what are we doing?
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_02: Even if you don't have the answers, allow yourself to feel the injustice of this moment.
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_02: This was in Barcelona.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_02: And there's something about ports and goodbyes that's been with us for as long as we have been near the sea.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_02: And I don't know their relationship, but I know that this is a real hug that means something to both of them.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_02: But once again, the tear is a sign that you are living and have humanity within you.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_02: I always I hope I'll meet her one day because I always say, how kind does she look?
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: She looks like such a kind person.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_02: And these words, systemic change for collective liberation, a lot of people say, What does that mean?
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_02: Well, systemic change for me is when we all stop aspiring to be part of the machinery that is destroying the only planet we have.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_02: Just five years ago, there would never have been the revulsion that I saw of Jeff Bezos' wedding.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_02: For the first time, I saw male friends of mine saying, nah, I don't need to be that rich.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I don't, I don't, I don't need to be able to rent a Venice for a wedding.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_02: I have friends that are now asking themselves how they can stop using things in the Amazon ecosystem.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_02: And when I tell them about farmers that are getting cancer due to the data centers Amazon owns, they actually start doing the research.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_02: Systemic change.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_02: It's just thinking about how First Nation people lived, how they understood the land, they understood the fluidity of seasons, and that time and memories and stories matter more than things to accumulate too.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_02: Christmas time a few years ago, I was looking at my girls ripping over present after present.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_02: I looked to my wife, I'm like, what are we doing here?
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_02: They don't care about these things.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_02: We've been programmed to give them things when they want moments and memories.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_02: The stillness of my youngest one's cheek when she rubs it against mine is something that she wants more than any toy.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_02: And as I walk my dog in the mornings and listen to the trees and try and connect to a world that many genocided nations knew all too well, I realize that we have been programmed to harm this earth.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_02: And we as a community can start planting the new seeds to make sure that our children's children have a fighting chance of a livable planet.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_02: I've got to meet many extraordinary people with my lens, but this one was a big one for me.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_02: Wael Aldado, Bureau Chief of Al Jazeera, reported whilst his family was being murdered, his wife, two of his sons, including Hamza, who was also a reporter, his daughter and grandson, all murdered by Israeli weapons missiles.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_02: And I was like, what am I even going to say when I meet him?
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_02: And the thing about men like this, so many extraordinary people like this, is the grace, the grace of him recognizing my humanity when he has suffered so much.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_02: Traveling the world to make sure that stories don't die, because we know history is written by the victors, and many of the victors deny the existence of the human beings that were always there, just as we have seen in America, which just turned 250 years with absolutely next to zero mention of the First Nation people of America.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_02: He did this whilst healing, whilst still healing, injured himself.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_02: And these are the men that we are told that we should not see the humanity of.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_02: We don't know what the future holds, but I know that my images will outlive us all.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_02: And there will be custodians to make sure that people will know what we did during this time.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_02: I don't usually post these images because I struggle talking about them, but I had been trying to get you know into Gaza and it was just impossible.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_02: But one of the first ceasefires, I said, Miss Anders a window, we have uh children that are in Egypt, and I was like, I would love to do a photography course.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_02: This is one thing I can do, right?
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and I went and I spent time with these amazing boys and girls, and the talent was amazing, the lust for life was amazing, and of course, I was I will I begged to take their portraits as well because so many times with Palestinian children, we see them either dead or dying, definitely not showing them as they should be seen.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_02: And these images just show these children to be kids, kids that have had too much already taken from them, but are as deserving as all of your children for a future of possibility, and no one will ever make me stop seeing these children's need for a future of possibility.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_02: How dare anyone deny the future of any child?
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_02: If we have to debate that, then we are lost as human beings.
• 33:03
  SPEAKER_02: He was so happy and proud, he wanted to show him his dabka.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_02: And I was like, sure.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_02: And he did this his thing, and I again I was like, Mr.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_02: Do not do not cry.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_02: He's happy, he's healthy, he's being a boy.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_02: Do your job, take the picture, show his joy.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_02: And that's exactly what I did on a rooftop in Cairo.
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_02: And in that moment, he is completely happy.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_02: And then I met the mothers.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_02: Many of these women have to leave their older children to bring the young, leave their husbands.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_02: And I spoke to them, I listened to them.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_02: And what was so powerful with all of them is their sense of returning home to the land where they gave birth to their children, where they want to grow old.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_02: But I was particularly moved by their strength.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_02: I haven't seen strength like that.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_02: Not in person.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_02: I've never seen strength like that.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_02: They would sing songs, sometimes freezing intense, sometimes not knowing when the next meal is, worrying about friends, worrying about their babies, but hope never left them.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_02: And it's important that you all recognize that.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_02: You know, the World Cup is on, we're dealing with longer days, and the world can distract us from what matters.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_02: Just remember that there is no point to all of this if we gallop towards oblivion on the bones of dead children.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_02: They're thriving, they're happy in Egypt, but they do want to go home.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_02: And it was just a really important project, and I hope to go back and see them and continue to support the boys and girls, be boys and girls.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_02: This is one of the youngest ones.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_02: She had a snooze downstairs whilst listening to Miss Rachel.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_02: But I look at her hair and her eyes, and I curse creation.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_02: I really do.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_02: When I have to witness the other the things we've all witnessed in this room.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_02: If there is somebody watching all over us, I have one request, and it's a really simple one.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_02: Let these children grow old.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_02: Philippa.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_02: We've become friends.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_02: She comes to the gallery a lot.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_02: These days will define us.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_02: These days will define us.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_02: I remember walking towards her on the Mow, and I saw that sign, and I was like, you've done it again.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_02: And she just stood there quietly, holding it almost like it's more than a sign.
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_02: But there's a surety to her that gives me strength to this day.
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_02: Nina Simone, I think if you follow me, you know I spoke about this, but it's such an interesting quote.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_02: The people that built their heaven on your land are telling you yours is in the sky.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_02: I find that just so, so powerful.
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_02: And a reminder of what colonialism, occupation can be.
• 38:07
  SPEAKER_02: Even if you look at Nigeria, my country, new religion was brought, new ways to value things were brought.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_02: Bronzes are in museums all over the world, many of them still not returned.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_02: I look at Congo.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_02: All our consumer devices today cannot function.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yet there are boys and girls in mines, and the way they die is not just getting crushed.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_02: Mines close in deep.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_02: So the boys are there slowly losing oxygen and suffocating to death so we can have bigger batteries in our Teslas and buy a new phone every September.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_02: One of these tech companies has one trillion dollars cash reserves.
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_02: And you're telling me that they can't invest in Congolese diaspora and in country to make sure that there is not a single human being under the age of 18 working in any of those mines.
• 39:16
  SPEAKER_02: It is up to us, the consumer, to force them to do it.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_02: Because that's the only language they understand.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_02: What made apartite break was consumerism or using it to fight.
• 39:35
  SPEAKER_02: And it's important.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_02: There's direct action, there's walking in the streets, but one of the other powers you have is how you spend the dollar and pound.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_02: And think about Sudan, think about Venezuela.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_02: Think about all of the inhumanity in the world, and don't think it's overwhelming.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_02: For me, it softens my heart.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_02: I feel awakened by it because it allows me to understand what I can do to help.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_02: No one's asking you to change the world.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_02: They're just asking you to go on a journey of unlearning and understanding the ills of our collective past so you can know why we are in the mess of our present with the hope that we can build a future we all deserve to inherit.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_02: I want to finish by reading the words of my friend, we are now friends, I'm very proud to say that, Omar El Akkard, in his book One Day Everyone Would Have Always Been Against This, which genuinely changed my life.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_02: I'm quite dyslexic, so I I listen to audiobooks a lot, and I thank God I listened to the audiobook because he has this gentle cadence.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_02: And it felt like all of the questions I couldn't find answers to were answered by his pen.
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_02: His pen wrapped itself around me at a time that I really needed it.
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm going to read you this excerpt, and I think uh we can do QA's afterwards if you want.
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_02: Alongside the ledger of atrocity, I keep another.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_02: The Palestinian doctor who would not abandon his patients even as the bombs closed in.
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_02: The Icelandic writer who raised money to get the displaced out of Gaza.
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_02: The American doctors and nurses who risked their lives to go treat the wounded in the middle of a killing field.
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_02: The puppet maker injured and driven from his home who kept making dolls to entertain the children.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_02: The congresswoman who stood her ground in the face of censure, of constant vitral, of her own colleagues' indifference.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_02: The protesters, the ones who gave up their privilege, their jobs, who risked everything to speak out.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_02: The people who filmed and photographed and documented all of this, even as it happened to them, even as they buried their dead.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_02: It's not so hard to believe, even during the worst of things, that the courage is a more potent contagion.
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_02: That there are more invested in solidarity than annihilation.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_02: That just as it has always been possible to look away, it is always possible to stop looking away.
• 42:30
  SPEAKER_02: None of this evil was ever necessary.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_02: Some carriages are gilded and others are lacquered in blood, but the same engine pulls us all.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_02: We dismantle it now, build another thing entirely, or we hurtle toward the cliff.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you very much.
• 43:22
  SPEAKER_02: Is there a microphone for folks?
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 43:26
  SPEAKER_02: Should we do that?
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_02: Do we have any questions?
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_05: Hi Vitan.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_05: It's not really a question.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_05: It's just to say thank you so much.
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_05: I genuinely don't think I would have survived the last three years.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_02: Each other together.
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_02: I generally do.
• 44:02
  SPEAKER_02: I've spoken about sometimes being on the tube and I see someone with a little badge and we look at each other and we're like Yeah.
• 44:11
  SPEAKER_02: And then there's there's a stillness.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_02: It's just there.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_02: There are people who I meet, and and just because I know um what what they're going through, it's a completely different connection.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_02: It's unbelievable how you can have such deep connections with people you've never met before.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_02: So I I hear and feel you, and I reciprocate.
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_02: You've all held me together.
• 44:33
  SPEAKER_02: Believe.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_02: I can't really see.
• 44:42
  SPEAKER_02: Any more questions?
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_02: We have like 10 minutes, so oh, there's someone up there.
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_03: Thank you, Mizen.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_03: It's a pleasure to see you and hear you speak.
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_03: Um you alluded to two things, but my question is um, what do you think we can do and should be doing um in these challenging times?
• 45:09
  SPEAKER_03: You alluded to two things talk to your friends, to talk to your colleagues, don't let the conversation dry up, and you have power to s to spend your money the way you want to.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_03: But what advice would you give me?
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I I would also say curate, curate what the other two things is curate what what the hell you are consuming online.
• 45:28
  SPEAKER_02: Um I wouldn't be on X at all, you know.
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_02: I have to be on X because it's how I know what what new attack is coming for me.
• 45:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um but in general, I would suggest you stay off X and just even on Instagram, Facebook, whatever you choose to, if you are online, is to really, really curate it and also think before you post.
• 45:48
  SPEAKER_02: I have this two-hour rule.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_02: When I see something that's really triggering me, I wait two hours.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_02: And there's that great roomy quote um raise your words, not your voice, for it is rain that grows flowers, not thunder.
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_02: And that's really, really important in this age of rage.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_02: It's for us to let our waters simmer a bit.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_02: So two more.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks.
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_02: Any more?
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_02: Quezies?
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_02: Hello?
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_02: Hello?
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, there's a few down here.
• 46:31
  SPEAKER_07: Hello, Miss Ann, thank you so much.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_07: Um it really resonated with me when you talked about being neurospicy.
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_07: I have a very neurospicy child.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_07: Um and what I felt from you is that you feel very deeply, and so does he.
• 46:45
  SPEAKER_07: And I think for people like you and my son and others who identify in this way, the heartbreak is constant because you feel so deeply all the time and you soak up so much.
• 46:58
  SPEAKER_07: How do you deal with that heartbreak again and again?
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_02: I thank you for that question.
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_02: And I so many people have said this in comments, saying that they believe that neurodivergent people do, you know, are natural uh activists and things like that.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_02: I I haven't seen any studies, so I wouldn't, I can't confirm.
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_02: But um I would actually be more in a really bad place if I wasn't doing something about it.
• 47:27
  SPEAKER_02: So what I've learned is, and it isn't necessarily sort of just the act of activism, it's going on the journey of having the inquisitive mind, right?
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, reading about our past, about things that have linked us to our past are really, really important.
• 47:48
  SPEAKER_02: I was saying in a piece I just did, Caroline Elkins' book, Legacy of Violence, is also really, really important.
• 47:53
  SPEAKER_02: So I've just done a lot of reading.
• 47:55
  SPEAKER_02: And then beyond that, I've, and I don't want to sound like some new age person, but um nature, honestly, my dog, my my my beautiful nine-year-old dog who doesn't give a damn how many Oscar nominations or how fancy my friends are, uh sleeping under a willow tree, um, walking, and I know your your your son is probably thinks all of these things are boring, but for me, it's really helped me reset.
• 48:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and also being around people that don't take that energy, which is really, really important.
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_02: So, what I've had to learn, and many of you will probably agree, is that there are people that are supposed to be in your life for seasons.
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_02: Cherish those memories, but don't hurt yourself by clinging on to someone that doesn't see the humanity or somebody else.
• 48:46
  SPEAKER_02: And that's really important as well.
• 48:48
  SPEAKER_07: Thank you.
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_08: Hi there, thank you.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_08: Um I cannot stop what to think.
• 48:58
  SPEAKER_08: Um there is a connection between images and imagination.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_08: Imagination.
• 49:03
  SPEAKER_08: Um I would like to ask which one comes for you first.
• 49:07
  SPEAKER_08: Is it the image that plays with your imagination or vice versa?
• 49:11
  SPEAKER_08: Throughout your presentation, I couldn't stop what to think about Fred or Kahle.
• 49:15
  SPEAKER_08: When you look at the images, it plays with your imagination and also reflects her true feelings.
• 49:22
  SPEAKER_08: They're very they come across very strongly.
• 49:24
  SPEAKER_08: So it would be interesting to know which one comes for you first, which one follows next.
• 49:29
  SPEAKER_08: Thank you.
• 49:30
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
• 49:30
  SPEAKER_02: Uh yeah, I mean I I um the reason I guess the quality of my photography kind of exploded in the way that it did is because I've been obsessed with uh light my whole life.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_02: One of my favorite films is um Barry Linden by Sandy Kubrick, which is a living painting.
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_02: And I all say photography is chasing this lady called light and trying to dare ask if you could waltz with this lady called Light.
• 50:02
  SPEAKER_02: And um I don't use Photoshop, I don't have 10 assistants, any of you have to see me in a protest, just me in my backpack, and I'm in a transient state when I'm shooting, but I'm always looking to waltz with light.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_02: So I think that is part of the imagination of how I compose and I structure my images, even though it's in an instant, it's not the same thing.
• 50:24
  SPEAKER_02: Because the the great point is, of course, many of my images that have become iconic, there were 50 other photographers, stood right where I was.
• 50:33
  SPEAKER_02: But there's something about how you see, and everyone sees it in their own way, that allows you to compose the human story that either connects or doesn't.
• 50:42
  unknown: Can I respond to the comment you made about my thing?
• 50:45
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_08: Um you um talk about Rumi, he has a saying, um wound is where the light enters, and I think that's that maybe explains your fascination with his poetry.
• 50:58
  SPEAKER_08: Thank you.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_02: The wound, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_02: Um yes.
• 51:03
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I don't want to go on a therapy session, but yes.
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_02: I think we we can do two more questions.
• 51:09
  SPEAKER_02: Is that okay?
• 51:10
  SPEAKER_02: If there are, is there any man who's gonna ask questions?
• 51:14
  SPEAKER_02: Huh, dudes?
• 51:21
  SPEAKER_02: Speaking of speaking of men, a friend of mine called me, said she's getting a divorce.
• 51:27
  SPEAKER_02: And I know her and her husband pretty well.
• 51:31
  SPEAKER_02: And she's been changed in the last three years.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_02: And uh she said, Miss Ann, he cries in church when he sings the hymn Jerusalem, and when I bring up what's happening in Jerusalem, he switches off.
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_02: And it was just a profound way of of um trying to, for me, to understand obviously a big family dilemma, but also as a man to understand why for some men it's been really difficult to go on a journey when I've seen so many women from all walks of life do that.
• 52:11
  SPEAKER_02: I had five percent of my followers be men at the beginning of this, and I'm really proud to say it's now 38%.
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_02: So don't give up on men.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um, they process the world differently, but they're you know, it's it's it's it sounds ridiculous, but everyone takes a different pathway to sometimes get to the same place.
• 52:33
  SPEAKER_02: So it's really important.
• 52:35
  SPEAKER_02: Sorry.
• 52:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um Hello.
• 52:37
  SPEAKER_00: How are you there?
• 52:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, man.
• 52:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um you mentioned Sudan.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_00: I wonder will you have an opportunity to go there, one of the worst worst places just now, and uh just interested what what future projects you have lined up and how they come about.
• 52:55
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_02: Um I do have a planned trip to Sudan actually, but for security reasons I can't tell you when I'm going in or out.
• 53:02
  SPEAKER_02: But that's already planned.
• 53:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I'm going to do a vaccination situation in Nigeria.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um again, I can't tell you the date, and we'll be going back, obviously, to see those kids as well in Cairo.
• 53:17
  SPEAKER_02: Beyond that, I have gosh projects for black children with Down syndrome that I'm still trying to get out there.
• 53:26
  SPEAKER_02: I'm um I have two films that are almost ready to begin the prep stage.
• 53:32
  SPEAKER_02: So I'll be directing two feature films.
• 53:34
  SPEAKER_02: And in general, just continuing with the work of documenting protests globally, trying to get my archive of images to travel around England and the world, as you know, because of Palestine.
• 53:48
  SPEAKER_02: We don't have uh the luxury of having big sponsors, even though I'm probably the most visible photographer on earth.
• 53:54
  SPEAKER_02: But as you also know, I will never remove Palestine from my body of work.
• 54:00
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks.
• 54:13
  SPEAKER_01: Sorry, sorry.
• 54:14
  SPEAKER_01: This is this is not a question, this is an advert.
• 54:17
  SPEAKER_01: Was joined the documentary shooting the shoot the people about you?
• 54:20
  SPEAKER_01: Friday.
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_01: On Friday.
• 54:21
  SPEAKER_01: Please go.
• 54:23
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 54:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's this Friday at the next door, right?
• 54:27
  SPEAKER_01: It's at the Pitcherville Cinema at the National Museum.
• 54:30
  SPEAKER_01: So if you haven't seen it, please be what was the experience like of uh making the making the documentary?
• 54:35
  SPEAKER_02: It's weird um uh having your life story for 90 minutes, but again, for people that look like me, i.e.
• 54:45
  SPEAKER_02: black people, we usually have to be dead for documentaries to be made.
• 54:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um it's crazy.
• 54:50
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I'm not your negro, James Baldwin's story, he was dead.
• 54:54
  SPEAKER_02: Choice of weapons, Gordon Park's story, he was dead.
• 54:57
  SPEAKER_02: Ernest Cole came out last year, he was also gone.
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_02: And there are plenty of white artists who have many documentaries made of them whilst they're living.
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_02: So when this opportunity came, and I was seeing the madness of the world, I thought, you know, let's do it, and maybe you can help people know that they're not alone and their voice matters.
• 55:15
  SPEAKER_02: So if you have the opportunity, please watch it.
• 55:18
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks.
• 55:19
  SPEAKER_02: I saw your hand up.
• 55:20
  SPEAKER_02: Do you want to just talk about the project?
• 55:32
  SPEAKER_02: One that I'm not able to do, well, yeah.
• 55:38
  SPEAKER_02: I mean that there there are certain parts of the world um that that are just tricky security-wise for me to get into.
• 55:48
  SPEAKER_02: I'm figuring that out and trying to beg my wife to let me let me go.
• 55:53
  SPEAKER_02: Um I'm very frustrated.
• 55:55
  SPEAKER_02: I've been documenting Grenfell uh for eight years now, getting on to nine, and I'm just losing my mind over the lack of interest from this government on the biggest loss of life in a civilian building since the Second World War.
• 56:10
  SPEAKER_02: So it's not that I can't do it, but I get very frustrated about I'm not doing enough.
• 56:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um there are, although I go to Nigeria, there are parts of northern Nigeria where I can't get to for security reasons, but I'm figuring out what I can do there as well.
• 56:24
  SPEAKER_02: But I'm not really good at saying I can't do things, so I'm gonna figure it out, and if there's any way I can help, um uh I will I will use my voice and lens.
• 56:36
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks.
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_02: Oh my lord.
• 56:40
  SPEAKER_06: Uh hi.
• 56:42
  SPEAKER_06: Uh I just wanted to ask, um, you know, during you're actually taking the photos, is it any like do you experience any like, I don't know, like backlash or racism during like the actual thing for many people like watching or something?
• 56:56
  SPEAKER_02: Uh great question.
• 56:58
  SPEAKER_02: Um yeah.
• 56:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um depending who I'm photographing, because of course I photographed um Tommy Robinson marches, far-right marches, I f I photographed pro-Israel marches, I have been, yeah, spat on.
• 57:11
  SPEAKER_02: I've been, I was recently just called the N-word and a monkey by um a pro uh I don't even know how to describe it, it was at a Iran march, and it was a sort of there are many different elements of the Iran uh situation, and this, these, these guys, it was the same day as the women's march, and some women got very upset at the group.
• 57:36
  SPEAKER_02: They kind of met together, and the group was um dancing to uh the Donald Trump song and thanking Ben uh Benjamin Netanyahu that upset the women.
• 57:48
  SPEAKER_02: I tried to get to calm things down, and one of them said, I'm the N-word monkey, go away.
• 57:53
  SPEAKER_02: And I was like, So that happens, but you know what?
• 57:57
  SPEAKER_02: I've learned that the mainly men that do and say those things are um traumatized, uh, just like the Tommy Robinson guys I've seen that have always called me the N-word, and I call them broken boys and men's bodies, and if anything, I try and look into their eyes and see the humanity.
• 58:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um, because only hurt people want to hurt the world.
• 58:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and that's just part of what I do.
• 58:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um sometimes I'm in danger dangerous situations, but it it comes with a territory.
• 58:32
  SPEAKER_06: Thank you.
• 58:33
  SPEAKER_02: Cheers.
• 58:35
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, thank you.
• 58:37
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.