A new virtual exhibition exploring Brent’s 300-year mixed-race and multicultural history through art, photography and fashion has launched.
The exhibition By The Cut of Their Cloth (BTCOTC) is hosted by The Mixed Museum in collaboration with local artist and designer Warren Reilly.
The 23-year-old was the creative director of Fashioning Our History, an exhibition staged last year as part of Brent 2020: London Borough of Culture.
“Connecting with The Mixed Museum, an organisation that was established exactly to represent and celebrate the history of people like me, it is no wonder that it felt natural that we would choose to collaborate on a project like this," Warren said.
“As a local artist and designer who has grown up in Brent, it is very clear that our communities are crying out for much-needed support and enrichment, which is exactly why the Being Brent Heritage Wellbeing Fund has been so important. I feel so proud and thankful that I could use my creativity to further understand my own mixed-race identity and heritage while encouraging others to do the same.”
BTCOTC showcases Brent’s long history of racial mixing with a special focus on the stories of “ordinary” people throughout seven main sections.
The section Stories of Colonial Brent takes a closer look at Brent’s colonial past while Multiracial Brent showcases stories of modern migration and multiculturalism from the borough.
The Boy from Brent is a section curated from Warren’s family archive and Archive Discoveries shows findings from Brent museums and archives.
Additionally, in Brent Stories residents and creatives share stories of their mixed-race and multicultural histories, Fashioning Our History explores stories of racial mixing and multiculturalism using fashion as a lens, and the last section Artistic Responses encourages creative responses to historical accounts.
Chamion Caballero, director of The Mixed Museum, said: “Our respective interests in using fashion to shine a light on the hidden histories of unknown Black, Asian and mixed-race sitters in historical works of art and photographs led us to develop the idea for By The Cut of Their Cloth, where we worked with Brent residents to uncover their multiracial and mixed family histories.”
The free virtual exhibition can be viewed here mixedmuseum.org.uk/BTCOTC/
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