- Venue
- Vivid Projects - Online
- Starts
- Thursday, July 16, 2020
- Ends
- Wednesday, July 22, 2020
- Address
- Unit 16 Minerva Works 158 Fazeley St Birmingham B5 5RS
- Location
- Across UK
- Organiser
- Vivid Projects on Vimeo
African Oasis (Yugesh Walia, 1982, produced by Roger Shannon for Birmingham Film Workshop)
We are delighted to launch the screenings with Birmingham based director Yugesh Walia’s 1983 film, African Oasis.
“A culture needs a centre”
These are the opening words of African Oasis, spoken by Derrick Anderson. African Oasis is a documentary exploring the former Handsworth Cultural Centre in Birmingham. The centre was a community based cultural project initially set up as the Handsworth Alternative Scheme (HAS) with Home Office funding, to assist the probation service in finding alternatives to custody for young Black offenders from the Handsworth area. Within a few years, the Centre moved on from being an after-care facility to an oasis of cultural activity for Handsworth’s Black community. The film includes interviews with centre users including Kokuma Dance Company and the centre’s visionary founder, Bob Ramdhanie.
African Oasis is one of a trio of films that Yugesh Walia made highlighting aspects of Black and Asian culture in 80’s Britain (Mirror Mirror, 1980; Sweet Chariot, 1981; African Oasis, 1982). In 2018 Birmingham Museums Trust acquired the three films for the city’s collection through the award-winning Collecting Birmingham project. Funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, the project enabled the people of Birmingham to take an active role in developing the city’s collection so that it better reflects their stories of growing up, living and working in the city.
Watch African Oasis here from 16-22 July.
