The line-up for this year’s Migration Matters Festival has been unveiled, with a range of artists, professionals, youth groups and others taking part to mark the celebration. The annual festival, running from June 14th to 22nd, promises a fully challenging and inspired programme, across a variety of different performance and delivery types.
The Migration Matters Festival, now in its ninth year, celebrates the theme of ‘Sanctuary in the Steel City’, inspired by the city being the first to be named as such in 2016. The festival aims to highlight how “the city has a proud record of welcoming new people from the far reaches of the world. It’s a city which has opened its doors, and most importantly become a place of sanctuary for those people most in need”. As in previous years, the festival coincides with National Refugee Week and allows people “to champion the voices of people who are so often muted, pigeon-holed into labels and rarely genuinely offered a chance to shape in the cultural and artistic landscape of the cities they live in”.
This year’s festival is being headlined by musical duo Amadou & Miriam, the Grammy Award-nominated artists who have become known colloquially as “the blind couple from Mali”. They are being joined at the festival by a range of other performers, including writer and musician Roger Robinson, Swiss band Sirens of Lesbos and local climate group Ark Sheffield. They will also be joined by performers of many ages and backgrounds, with charity Stand & Be Counted (SBC) Theatre also in attendance at this year’s festival. The festival have said that their “best-ever lineup includes 50+ events to enjoy across art, theatre, drag, dance, food, comedy, children’s events, climate change and more”.
As well as a diversity of performers and figures at the festival, the venues are equally varied, with Soft Ground, Weston Park Museum, The Montgomery Theatre, The Wave and The Crucible Theatre’s Adelphi Room hosting various events in the week-long festival. It is hoped that this will give visitors the opportunity to explore the city and its history, as well as those who reside within it.
Back for its ninth year, this year’s Migration Matters festival promises an exciting week of events to encourage us to think and reflect on the important contributions that migrants have played in our cultural heritage. Occurring after the final semester exams, there’s no better chance to explore the festival, and the people behind the works on display.
Migration Matters Festival will be taking place from June 14th until June 22nd. The full programme and tickets are available here
