Leicester New Walk Museum: Collaboration and Participation

A major art installation on the theme of Home and Identity at Leicester New Walk Museum and Art Gallery was created by people seeking sanctuary from the Journey’s Festival Roots Group, in late spring 2019 and was exhibited for four months at New Walk Museum. The exhibition was a community response by the group to the loan of the King Richard III portrait to Leicester museums by the National Portrait Gallery as part of its ‘Coming Home’ exhibition. The Museum Arts Coordinator worked with the group and George Sfougaras, a local print artist from a refugee background. Each group member created a giant collage portrait of themselves, choosing images resonant of their home and identity to fill their silhouette.

Collage was chosen as an accessible and non-threatening technique for those with little previous art experience or confidence. The group then learnt the skills of silk screen printing with the artist, and their prints were laid on topof the series of collage portraits and enhanced digitally, and finally were printed as huge textile banners which have been displayed in the Cathedral and museum over the summer.