ROOT-ed (Revolution Of Our Time) is a social platform and zine dedicated to promoting, inspiring, and showcasing Black, indigenous and other people of color creatives in the North West of England. Their newest quarterly edition came out 21 October and is about queer, trans and intersex people of colour, in collaboration with Homotopia Fest. We talked to the founders Amber Akaunu and Fauziya Johnson about the creative industries, Black History Month, and their work as a platform.
How did ROOT-ed zine begin?
ROOT-ed began in 2018 when, as two final year fine art students, we (Amber Akaunu and Fauziya Johnson) wanted to collaborate on an art project. Being the only two People of Colour (PoC) in our year, we both noticed the lack of representation of PoC creatives within the North West, and how it was notably, and significantly lacking in academia, institutions, media, and generally all aspects within the art world.
We fundraised our first magazine in the Unity Theatre in Liverpool, and had performers who were of colour to help the night. We made about £400 from that night with thanks to those who participated, and therefore had enough to print for our first issue. That issue featured Lubaina Himid and came out 21 March 2018.
What do you see as the greatest successes you’ve had since starting ROOT-ed?
It would generally be how well we are able to help artists get opportunities, and how we are able to start paying people as we’ve applied to funding and crowdsourced. Albeit it’s not loads of money and high commissions but it’s something for the meantime.
People have told us how much it means for them to be in a printed magazine, and the opportunities that they’ve had from it – such as exhibitions, news articles, live event participations, commissions etc. That is so special to hear because that’s exactly what we noticed was lacking a couple years ago and aimed to change. It’s becoming a bit more of a reality now for North West PoC’s to be recognised and inputted into exhibition programmes and have freelance opportunities, by notable people reading our zine and hiring the artists out of it.
How do you think Black History Month should be celebrated in the media?
From our experience, we gather the most ‘attention’ during Black History month, which we feel uneasy about. On the one hand, the more recognition the better since we are able to utilise this to help other Black creatives. On the other, it means that this recognition is likely to be short lived and not repeatable throughout the year.
It should be used as a time to really highlight exactly what happened in the past – as an obvious example, details regarding the Transatlantic Slave Trade have not been taught with what actually happened. People seem to think it’s just a distant event in the past where a couple of bad things happened, when in fact it was so much worse than what the majority of people know… Because of this lack of education the atrocities that actually happened are not highlighted. This needs to be highlighted in schools especially – and also given an update on modern racism today.
In media, this should be a time for media companies to internally examine who they’ve applauded or reprimanded publicly, their internal colleagues (if they have taken diversity and inclusion exams, at least), and if they have actively tried to hire more Black freelance and full time workers. Publicly, they need to highlight ‘hidden figures’ within Afro-Caribbean history, and equally highlight who the pioneers are now.
How does ROOT-ed commit to creatives in the North West of England?
We commit to everything that we do from the pages of the zine, the posts we share on social media and the conversations we have with arts institutions. Our aim as a platform has always been to promote, support and inspire BIPoC creatives. We want to be able to promote our network of artists to hopefully help them and their work reach a bigger audience or for them to get work from being promoted in the zine. We host events such as art crits and networking events which is how we support Black, indigenous and PoC creatives on a more intimate level. We also hope the content of the zine can inspire all creatives who read it in some way.
What do you see as needing to change in both the art and publishing worlds ROOT-ed exists in, to become more accessible and welcoming to diverse voices?
There’s so much that needs to change from the work that is exhibited and published to the people curating and publishing the work. It’s not an unknown fact that the creative industries, especially at high level positions, are very, very white. It’s difficult for there to be genuine lasting change when institutions don’t give up space to Black, indigenous and PoC. Tokenism is an outcome of these white spaces, even when they try their best to mean well. This is an issue we actually talked about in our latest issue of ROOT-ed with artist Lubaina Himid.
Follow ROOT-ed on social media: @ROOTedZine
Visit their website: www.rootedzine.co.uk