Ruth Beale

For the 2025 Deptford X Parade, Ruth Beale worked with pupils from Deptford Green and Watergate schools  to reflect on the power and the role of silence in activism. Through workshops, the young people explored ways to express themselves when not being heard and what they want to change about the world.

Drawing on the connections between a march, protest, parade and procession, and their significance as public acts, Silent Parade will look deeper into the role of banners, costumes, sounds and visuals we often see in parades, whilst thinking about the value of protest, when it has made a difference and when it hasn’t, and times when it’s been suppressed.

On Thursday 17 July join the Silent Parade as we walk the streets of Deptford and celebrate what it means to have a collective voice.

Thursday 17 July, 1pm – 2pm

To join the Parade, meet outside Deptford Lounge in Giffin Square at 1pm or join us on the route as we weave our way along Deptford High Street to Reginald Road and back to Giffin Square again, before turning left onto Douglas Way towards the end point in Fordham Park. 

Thank you to Deptford Green and Watergate Schools and Deptford Lounge for your support and continued involvement. 

Access information: Deptford Lounge has level access and Changing Places toilets, with additional public toilets available at the Albany. Frankham Street car park is 85 metres away from Deptford Lounge, with seven disabled bays.

Ruth Beale is a commissioned Deptford X 2025 Artist 

Ruth Beale is a South East London-based artist whose socially engaged art seeks to trouble societal structures, reframe knowledge hierarchies and advocate for collective approaches. They are committed to the radical possibilities of working collectively and collaboratively, and using dialogue and exchange to change who has the power, and what kinds of knowledges are valued. Their work grows from context-specific research and participatory processes, resulting in a wide variety of forms including events, public works, drawing, writing, installations and print. Often working collaboratively, they have created radio programmes, designed public interventions, and made performances and books. In 2012 they co-founded The Alternative School of Economics, which explores economic and political issues in relation to the complexity of lived experience. They founded The Hundred Club, a family club which uses art and play to explore social justice issues, with artist-led organisation TACO! in 2020. They teach in the Design Department at Goldsmiths and are a trustee of the Feminist Library. 

Ruth has worked with public institutions, galleries, local authorities and agencies on collaborative commissions, projects and residencies, including TACO!, Create London, Gasworks, Mansions of the Future, Brent Borough of Culture, Whitstable Biennale, UP Projects, Wysing Arts Centre and BFI. Recent commissions include Elastic Money with The Alternative School of Economics and At the Library/Rule of Threes, Bootle (2024-25), Care & Magic, Edgware Library, with Up Projects (2023-24), Drawing Risky Play with Turf Projects, Croydon, London (2023); and Library as Memorial with Brent Biennial, London (2020-21). Recent exhibitions include LIKE GODS at Deptford Lounge (2024) and Swiss Cottage Library Gallery, London (2023), Editorial Tables, Reciprocal Hospitalities, The Showroom, London (2023), Squidgy World at Turf Projects (2023), and a major new installation by The Alternative School of Economics in Economics the Blockbuster: It’s not Business as Usual, The Whitworth, University of Manchester (2023). Ruth published All the Libraries: Reader with Simon Elvins in 2023.

Image: Ruth Beale, Hundred Club billboard, 2021