Journey to Justice: Nottingham 

Journey to Justice: Nottingham was a four-month-long exhibition at the National Justice Museum in 2017. It was part of a UK-wide programme conceived by Journey to Justice, a London-based charity that 'galvanises people to take action for social change.' In 2013, it created a touring exhibition about less well-known stories about the civil rights movement in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s. When the exhibition visits a local town, local people, organisations, and community groups come together to create an exhibition that tells less well-known stories of social justice movements and change in their communities and develops a programme of events, responding to the exhibition. On 1 April 2017, the Galleries of Justice relaunched as the National Justice Museum, after receiving a £1 million Lottery Heritage grant in 2015, and Journey to Justice: Nottingham was one of the museum's inaugural exhibitions after the re-launch.

 

Journey to Justice: Nottingham worked with 30 partners, including Nottingham Trent, University of Nottingham, Nottingham College, Nottingham City Council, New Art Exchange, Sharewear, Backlit, Nottingham Castle, Framework Knitters Museum. The exhibition featured stories about Nottingham's role in the decriminalisation of sex between men, spotlighted Viv Anderson, the first black man to play for England, and commissioned a 3D artwork of Nottingham MP and abolitionists Samuel Morley that commemorated his relationship with Josiah Henson, a man born into slavery in America. The programme of 60 events ran in cultural and community venues across the city that highlighted 21st century anti-slavery strategies, workshops in schools about the civil rights movement in the United States, and poetry performances.

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I was the postgraduate project manager for the project, succeeding the outgoing project manager in January 2017. I fundraised £40,000 from Midlands3Cities and the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the largest award the consortium had administered, to deliver a large-scale, collaborative and public, city-wide programme. I line-managed 18 PhD colleagues who developed and delivered content for the exhibition - film, images, artworks - and for the programme of events. I co-produced the exhibition with the National Justice Museum's Curator, sitting on the exhibition and launch subgroups. I worked with the Midlands3Cities Finance Manager to pay staff, including monthly finance reporting, and managed key relationships with the project's 30 partner organisations. Together, we delivered the exhibition and a programme of 60 events across the city in cultural and community venues. I collected engagement data and wrote the funding report to Midlands3Cities and the Arts and Humanities Research Council.

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Below are a selection of films I line-produced from some of the projects for the programme.