A two-part day event expanding on the context of Deptford X’s history programmed by Beth Bramich & Sophie Chapman of Ditto Space and London Community Video Archive

A two-part day event based around creative self organising in the area historically, and now, through a morning exploring artist-led organising now and an afternoon looking to Deptford’s history of community video.

There will be a hot vegetarian lunch provided and drinks afterwards. We invite people to come for the day to share an intergenerational conversation around self-organising in the borough in the past and today.

There will be a BSL interpreter and print outs available. The venue is fully wheelchair accessible, with an accessible and gender neutral toilet.

Artist-led, Artist-run, Artist-owned
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From 10.30am – 12.30pm, free to attend, all welcome.

Join us for a conversation with artist-led projects that are expanding creative communities in South East London. We’ll hear from Sister Midnight, F.A.T. Studio and Alastair Kwan, and Carolina Ongaro.

Ditto Space is a new South East London project space set up by writer and researcher Beth Bramich and artist and organiser Sophie Chapman in collaboration with Rosalie Schweiker, Jaq Spooky and Frankie Légère. Ditto is based on Old Kent Road, in the former home of the Old Kent Road Arts Club run by F.A.T. Studio, and is a lo-fi, artist-run space for making work, developing projects, workshops, gatherings, meetings, rehearsals, and more.

F.A.T. Studio is a not-for-profit creative organisation operating from the beautiful south east of London. Rachel Sale (she/her) organises F.A.T. Studio’s social art projects with the other co-directors and local collaborators. She also leads F.A.T. Studio’s commercial design studio. Rachel is an artist working at the intersection of illustration, graphic design and socially-engaged art. She studied at the Royal College of Art and has a teaching post at UAL: Camberwell (both in London, UK). Rachel cares deeply about her local area of SE London and focuses her creative energy on supporting positive things to happen here.

Rachel will be joined by F.A.T Studio collaborator Alastair Kwan, a British-Born Hong Kong artist. Alastair recently graduated from MA Sculpture at the Royal College of Art and currently lives and works in London. Since graduating, he has developed a socially engaged practice, leading to major projects such as CONGEE and co-founding Liquid Gold Studios, both of which promote and engage local artistic communities. He positions his work between his Hong Kong heritage and experiences growing up in the UK, taking inspiration from cultural encounters and post-colonial theory.

Sister Midnight is a women-led not-for-profit organisation based in Lewisham, who are working towards opening the first community owned music venue in the borough. They have raised £300k towards their cause between over 950 local members of the community, and are taking on a derelict working mens club in catford, hoping to use the funds they’ve raised transform it into a cultural & creative community hub for all.

Carolina Ongaro is creative producer, researcher and grower based in London. Between 2014 and 2023 she ran Jupiter Woods, an arts organisation focused on research and collaborative practice in South East London, where she initiated multiple projects individually and collectively. She currently works with Grow Lewisham, a community organisation supporting growing projects in SE London focused on food and environmental justice in urban settings, and is currently developing Bridgehouse Gardens, a new community garden and community space designed for and with the local community in SE15, around Jupiter Woods. Through her work she makes use of dialogue and collaborative approaches to generate spaces for collective learning and producing, and explore the ways in which these, in turn, create the foundations for community-based economic models and ecologically-driven practices, grounded in community, solidarity, and wellbeing.

Beth Bramich is a writer and researcher living and working in South East London. Her writing has appeared in Art Monthly, Burlington Contemporary, and Frieze, and she regularly collaborates with artists on publications, films and events. She is a lecturer in Fine Art at the University of the Arts London.

Sophie Chapman is an interdisciplinary artist, researcher and organiser, from Newcastle – based in London. She works across film, sculpture, writing and music, as well as curation, facilitation, community building and access support. All her work is connected by a desire for, and a drive to create more collaborative, supportive, equitable and experimental structures for people to make, share and experience art, and make and share the world.

Access: There will be a BSL interpreter and print outs available. The venue is fully wheelchair accessible, with an accessible and gender neutral toilet.

From Albany Video to the London Community Video Archive
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From 2 – 5pm, free to attend, all welcome.

Join us for a viewing of films and a discussion with contributors and producers of Albany Video, hosted by London Community Video Archive and chaired by Ed Webb-Ingall.

In the afternoon, past Albany Video contributors and producers will showcase their films. Geoff Stow worked at Albany Video (AV) from the 1970s through to the late ‘80s. His films include a document of an adventure playground in Childers St Deptford; and a documetnary about Downham, ‘A Home in the Country’. Carol Stevens worked for Albany Video in the early 1980s and produced ‘A Netful of Holes’, about young women and homelessness. Carol Jacobs was with Albany Video in the late 1980s and produced a a programme called ‘Step Forward’, for Channel 4 about the Black music scene centred around South London. Pax Nindi worked as a volunteer with AV in the late 1980s and when AV folded, set up Paxvision – a video facility at the Albany.

The talk will be chaired by Ed Webb-Ingall, who organises the public programme for LCVA. He is a filmmaker and researcher working with archival materials and methodologies drawn from community video. He collaborates with groups to explore under-represented historical moments and their relationship to contemporary life, developing modes of self-representation specific to the subject or the experiences of the participants. Tony Dowmunt co-directs the London Community Video Archive. He is currently an Emeritus Professor at Goldsmiths, University of London, co-supervising Practice Research PhDs, mostly in the field of radical and ‘alternative’ documentary practices.