Goldlink 44 by Goldsmiths, University of London

Goldlink

SUMMER 2016 NO. 44

Keeping you in touch with Goldsmiths

Shazia Mirza

Graft and craft

Dead When I Got Here

Mark Aitken on his documentary

Creative Control

How Rosie Lowe found herÂ sound

Maths, Music & More Catching up with Eska

Patrick Loughrey Warden, Goldsmiths, University of London

Our alumni are one of Goldsmiths’ greatest assets. Our community starts in New Cross and stretches across the world, encompassing more than 50,000 former students and staff. Every individual is joined together by the experience of learning, working and growing with us on campus. Each year, hundreds of alumni reunite via an event series produced in collaboration with Alumni Ambassadors – Around the World in 7 Days; a series we hope to grow over the coming years. More than a thousand alumni have also joined Goldsmiths Connect, our new online mentoring platform for alumni, students and staff (both current and former). This new network is open to all wherever they are in the world – and in their careers. It is there for those starting out as well as those looking to re-energise their working lives. As a community, we have felt compelled to act on the humanitarian crisis impacting the world currently. We have offered financial help and drawn on academic expertise, knowledge and experience to contribute to the wider debate around this most urgent of issues. The generous spirit of our community is evident in the latest telephone campaign which raised over £120,000 in gifts and pledges for the Annual Fund which supports and enhances the lives of current students. In each edition of this long-running magazine we find out more about the lives of our alumni, from the recently graduated to those well established in their careers, such as the comic, Shazia Mirza (page 10). Wherever you are in the world or in your career, our doors are open and we want to hear from you. GOLDLINK 44

Editor Mary Davies Assistant Editor Minh Lam Design zoebather.co.uk Photography Shazia Mirza © Martin Twomey (cover and pages 10–14) Student Caller © Sarah Enderby (page 3) ‘Refugees Welcome’ here © Paul Quezada-Neiman/Demotix/ Press Association Images (page 4) Open Book founder Joe Baden © Sarah Ainslie (page 5) Syrian refugees arrive in Greece © Panayiotis Tzamaros/Demotix / Goldlink

Press Association Images (page 6) Josué thinking © Mark Aitken (page 19) Eska © Jaroslav Moravec (pages 22–26) Development & Alumni Office Goldsmiths, University of London New Cross, London SE14 6NW alumni@gold.ac.uk +44 (0)20 7896 2619 Update your details online at gold.ac.uk/alumni/update Support Goldsmiths gold.ac.uk/give

Contributions may be submitted for consideration by email. We reserve the right to edit articles in the interest of brevity and clarity. The opinions expressed in the magazine are those of the writers concerned and not necessarily of Goldsmiths. Goldlink is printed on paper accredited by the Forestry Stewardship Council. Like us on Facebook Goldsmiths Alumni Follow us on Twitter @GoldAlumni Read our blog Goldlink-Online.com

On the cover

Shazia Mirza, 2016 By Martin Twomey â&#x20AC;&#x201D; see Page 10

IN THIS ISSUE

02 News 06 Research 10 Interview

In conversation with Shazia Mirza

Degree Shows

15 One to Watch 16 Showcase

18 Dead When I Got Here Mark Aitken

on his documentary feature

20 Around The World Become an Alumni Ambassador

22 Maths, Music & More

Catching up with Eska

How Rosie Lowe found her sound

27 Life After 28 Creative Control 31 Original Works 32 Parting Shot

Summer 2016 No.44

2 News NEWS

CURZON AT GOLDSMITHS A pioneering partnership between Goldsmiths and Curzon Cinemas brings a full-time cinema to Lewisham after a gap of 15 years.

he revamped screening facilities in the Richard Hoggart Building will be used for teaching during weekdays, with the facility available for exclusive use by Goldsmiths students and staff until 6pm Monday to Friday. Programming at the 101-seat venue, which includes space for two wheelchair users, will follow Curzon’s mix of the best in cinema from across the globe as well as documentary and special director Q&As. It is the first such partnership between a university and cinema company and gives Goldsmiths one of the best campus cinemas in the country. Curzon Goldsmiths is part of the Curzon Connect initiative that includes screens at Arthouse Crouch End, Curzon Mondrian London and Pinewood Goldlink

Cinema has always been a vital part of Goldsmiths.

Cinema. The move also means Lewisham now has a full-time cinema and is no longer the only London borough without such a facility. Lewisham lost its last fulltime cinema when the Cannon in Catford closed in 2001. Patrick Loughrey, Warden of Goldsmiths, said: “Cinema has always been a vital part of Goldsmiths. From Oscar-winners to the use of film in research and teaching across the university, we have a rich screen heritage.” The cinema was formally opened by screen legend Lord David Puttnam who gave a surprise world premiere to his first film for 18 years, Arctic 30, the real-life story of a group of environmental activists seized by Russian troops in 2013

3 NEWS

MIT PARTNERSHIP UNDERSTANDING GENETICS A S new university press from Goldsmiths will partner with the MIT Press in a unique deal between the two prestigious institutions. The partnership will see all Goldsmiths Press titles marketed and distributed through MIT Press’ Cambridge, Massachusetts and London offices. The first title to be released is Academic Diary by the influential sociology professor and alumnus, Les Back. Goldsmiths Press will take advantage of digital technology to revive and regenerate the traditions and values of university press publishing. It is driven by a widely-recognised need for new forms of academic publishing in the digital age. The new venture highlights the strengths of Goldsmiths as an incubator of ideas and creativity for over a century

cientists from Goldsmiths have launched a new international consortium committed to improving public understanding about genetics in the fields of psychology and human development. The Accessible Genetic Consortium (TAGC) was formed on the back of Goldsmiths’ partnership with Tomsk State University, Russia. Led by Goldsmiths Professor of Genetics and Psychology Yulia Kovas, TAGC aims to communicate genetic knowledge in an accessible way and to address its ethical and legal implications to enable everyone to benefit from genetic discoveries. TAGC brings together efforts from scientists, media, lawyers and policymakers. It also provides key information, events, training and consultations at different levels

ANNUAL FUND

he Annual Fund has raised £120,000 in donations and pledges from the Goldsmiths alumni community. The amount was raised following a three-week telephone fundraising campaign staffed by our students. Surpassing last year’s total by over £15,000, the latest telephone campaign has been the most successful to date and demonstrates that when a large number of our alumni make a contribution, it translates into a significant and vital resource for the sustainment of the University. The money raised went to the Annual Fund contributing to the Student Hardship Fund as well as hundreds of projects led by students and staff at the University

Summer 2016 No.44

4 News NEWS

BEYOND BORDERS The current humanitarian crisis is the key issue confronting our world – and one which demands a response from all corners of society.

ix new scholarships for refugees are to be offered by Goldsmiths as part of its response to the ongoing displacement crisis. Worth more than £140,000 a year in total, the scholarships are being offered to three undergraduate students and three postgraduate students. Under the funding the full-time students’ teaching and accommodation fees will be waived. They will also receive maintenance bursaries of up to £10,000 a year – marking a significant increase in Goldsmiths’ funding for those affected by

events in the Middle East, Africa and Europe. Goldsmiths Students’ Union (GSU) has been instrumental in developing the funding packages and will continue to work alongside the University in responding to the crisis. The University and GSU will also work together to build on existing links with the academic charity Cara. Patrick Loughrey, Warden of Goldsmiths, said: “We have never seen events like those which unfolded over last summer. Those images and stories compelled us

to act – we simply could not stand by and do nothing. Goldsmiths is in a position of real privilege to be able to help, initially with these scholarships but also by developing an ongoing academic response to this terrible crisis.” Danny Nasr, President of the Students’ Union, said: “Education is the most powerful and sustainable resource on the planet. To those with nothing, and to those who have lost everything, education is the only meaningful mechanism of rebellion; the only meaningful mechanism of change.”

Education is the most powerful and sustainable resource on the planet.

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5 NEWS

GREENING GOLDSMITHS G

oldsmiths has been named as the greenest university in the capital, according to a prestigious international study. We have also been ranked the ninth most eco-friendly university in Britain and the 70th greenest in the world by the University of Indonesia’s Green Metric Tables for 2015. The league tables are drawn from 407 universities across the world. Rankings are assessed according to criteria like population of staff and students, percentage of green spaces in comparison to buildings as well as total energy use. Our success follows hard work by the Greening Goldsmiths team to dramatically increase our green standing. The team’s goal is to slash energy consumption on campus, improve recycling rates and reduce overall volumes of waste created

OPEN BOOK

project to open up education to people from disadvantaged backgrounds, including offenders and those suffering from addiction or mental health problems, won the Student Diversity and Widening Participation Guardian University Award 2016 for Goldsmiths. The Open Book scheme has worked with more than 1,000 people since being launched by alumnus Joe Baden in 2004. Its goal is to improve equality in higher education and access for the broad population who for institutional, structural or cultural reasons would not have previously considered higher education. From humble beginnings operating one day a week, Open Book now boasts a full timetable of classes, lectures and seminars at Goldsmiths and in Medway (funded by the Lankelly Chase Foundation)

GARY HUME SCHOLARSHIPS A

rtist Gary Hume is funding scholarships worth £75,000 to support students at Goldsmiths. The painter who studied Fine Art at Goldsmiths in the 1980s is giving the money to help art students from poorer backgrounds. Hume, who lives and works in London and New York, said his own experiences as a student had spurred him to support the scholarships. Hume said: “I decided to help because it’s incredibly difficult for young artists. I wanted to help lower the incredible burden on families to help in the current climate.” Referring to his own time as a young artist he said: “I loved it. It was where I was given the opportunity to grow in confidence as an artist and a person and have a chance to thrive rather than be regarded as a bit of a waste.”

Summer 2016 No.44

6 News RESEARCH

Goldsmiths has a proud tradition of being a place where research and teaching fuses together, providing a stimulating environment for learning, researching and innovating. Almost three quarters of our research has been rated as ‘world leading’ (4*) or ‘internationally excellent’ (3*) by the Research Excellence Framework 2014. Researchers here are constantly contributing to knowledge and practice in a range of disciplines from computing to art, the social sciences and beyond.

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KILLING BY OMISSION A

new investigation by researchers at Goldsmiths accuses European Union policymakers of “killing by omission” after cutting rescue missions in the Mediterranean in full knowledge of the lethal consequences of their actions. Meeting transcripts and documents unearthed in a report from Goldsmiths and the University of York show that the EU border agency Frontex’s own internal assessment of replacing Mare Nostrum with Triton predicted increased deaths at sea, but the policy was introduced anyway. A previously unreported 2014 Frontex internal assessment on “tackling migrant flows” stated: “It has to be stressed that the withdrawal of naval assets from

the area, if not properly planned and announced well in advance, would likely result in a higher number of fatalities.” The researchers from the ESRCfunded Precarious Trajectories project argue that because the decision to retreat from state-led search and rescue operations was taken in full knowledge of the risk, EU policymakers and agencies carry a strong degree of responsibility for mass deaths at sea. The report Death by Rescue: The lethal effects of the EU’s policies of non-assistance at sea demonstrates that agencies and policymakers enacted a policy of retreat from state-led search and rescue operations. The burden of extremely dangerous operations transferred to large merchant ships, which are ill-fitted and untrained to conduct them. EU policymakers and Frontex were aware that merchant ships are unfit for rescue operations, but ignored insistence from shipping industry professional organisations that catastrophic loss of life could occur. On 12 April, 400 people died when an overcrowded boat capsized due to its passengers’ excitement at the sight of approaching rescue tugboats. Six days later a similar incident killed 800, leading to the deadliest single shipwreck recorded in the Mediterranean. In 2015 there was a total of 3,700 documented deaths at sea Read more at deathbyrescue.org

7 RESEARCH

OPERATION WAR DIARY 27,000 volunteers have contributed to OWD since it launched in January 2014.

rofessor Richard Grayson (Department of History) has published the results of the first major academic analysis of historical data captured by the first online history crowdsourcing project, Operation War Diary (OWD). It found that across the British army on the Western Front infantry soldiers spent a maximum of 47% of their time at the front or fighting. The infantry engaged directly with the enemy on just one in five of their days abroad. Artillery soldiers spent 62% of their time either at the front or fighting, with the cavalry spending just 20% of their time at the front or fighting.

The research uses data from the first stage of OWD, led by The National Archives Imperial War Museums and academic crowdsourcing research group, Zooniverse, based at the University of Oxford. 27,000 volunteers have contributed to OWD since it launched in January 2014. They extracted metadata from digitised war diary entries dating to 1914-1918. “Even with less than half your time spent at the front and around one out of five days actually under fire, nobody should doubt that conditions were horrendous,” explains Professor Grayson. “It is also worth noting that these average figures mask some

remarkably lengthy periods at the front by some units. “But our research shows that popular representations of soldiers spending all day and night in the trenches – whether it’s in Blackadder, on the BBC Schools pages or popular histories and broadcasts – do not properly represent the broad pattern of the daily lives of soldiers.” Read more at operationwardiary.org

Summer 2016 No.44

8 News RESEARCH

TAXING THE SUPER RICH T

axing luxury homes in London bought by the global super-rich would raise more than £86 million a year for social and affordable housing, according to research undertaken at Goldsmiths. Properties in the capital worth £5 million or more sold for a combined £5.2 billion between 2011 and 2013 – with sales to wealthy overseas buyers making up half that amount. A 10% levy on those sales would have generated £260 million – or £86.7 million a year – to help key workers and those on low incomes struggling to buy or rent in the capital. The research was undertaken by academics at Goldsmiths, the University of Sheffield and the

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University of York. Professor Roger Burrows led on the project for Goldsmiths and was supported by colleagues from the Department of Sociology. One of the lead researchers, Professor Rowland Atkinson from the University of Sheffield,

A 10% levy on those sales would have generated £260 million.

said a tax imposed by central government on luxury property sales could be used to create an inclusive city fund to help counteract the adverse impact of super-rich investment on London’s housing market. Atkinson said the research suggested that a 10% levy would not deter the super-rich from investing in the capital because no other international city offered the same level of luxury services, cultural attractions and relative safety. The researchers also call for higher bands of council tax for the global super-rich, with the top level imposed on those who leave their homes vacant for more than three months a year

9 RESEARCH

CITIZEN SENSE T

he Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection has launched an unprecedented expansion of its air pollutionmonitoring programme in response to Goldsmiths-led research indicating levels of potentially health-damaging fine particulate matter in the state. Through the Citizen Sense project led by Dr Jennifer Gabrys (Department of Sociology), Pennsylvania residents received digital pollution monitoring and analysis equipment and training. Many participants exposed worrying levels of air pollution from natural gas infrastructure near their homes in the vicinity of fracking sites. On the basis of those preliminary

findings, the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR), a federal public health agency of the US Department of Health and Human Services, undertook follow-up monitoring in 2015. This year they released their report indicating levels of fine particulate matter that are of concern for sensitive groups of people. If sustained over a year the estimated levels would be similar to those in London. ATSDR recommended that the state-level Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection reduce emission sources and undertake monitoring in the area. By autumn 2017 the existing fine particle (PM2.5) air monitoring network of 27

monitoring sites will be expanded to include continuous monitoring sites in 10 northern and southwestern counties. The estimated total cost of the project over a five-year period is approximately $1.56 million or £1.06 million. Dr Gabrys commented: “These are extremely significant events in response to citizen action in the community, and show just how much of an impact this sort of truly progressive participatory research can have.” Funded by the European Research Council, the Citizen Sense project at Goldsmiths investigates digital sensors and environmental practice Read more at citizensense.net

Summer 2016 No.44

GRAFT 10 Feature

& CRAFT Goldlink

Shazia Mirza is a stand-up comedian and columnist who came to Goldsmiths in 1995 to train to be a teacher. Drawn to Goldsmiths for its creative reputation, her future career would end up taking a very different path.

hazia Mirza had been told that Goldsmiths was one of the best places to do teacher training in Britain, but that wasn’t the only reason she chose to study here. She always wanted to be on the stage and if she did her PGCE here, she could also do acting and writing classes in the evenings. And that is exactly what happened. “I loved Goldsmiths from the moment that I walked into it. I was living at the halls of residence in Camberwell on Flodden Road and I walked up to the famous Goldsmiths entrance, the picture that I’d already seen in so many places and I was there. I remember sitting in the canteen with the other students in my class all having lunch and it just felt really exciting, the start of something new. It was a really great atmosphere and the two teachers that taught me during my PGCE were these two very eccentric, big, grey curly hair, glasses – as you would think of stereotypical scientists. I can’t remember their names but remember exactly what they look like. They were brilliant. “Goldsmiths for me was such a productive and creative place. It was really special to me and really helped me to become a different person. “I studied drama with Steven Dykes and he actually taught me afterwards at Rose Bruford College. He actually helped me get into Rose Bruford. Steve was a brilliant teacher. He also used to write plays and get us to perform them. I remember him saying to me, ‘You’re really good at comedy. You’re really comedic. You should work on that.’ This was before I had even tried stand-up. I didn’t know I was going to be a comedian. I was desperate to be on stage and I always thought, ‘Right, I’m going to go to drama school and I’m going to be an actress.’”

Shazia taught in schools in Tower Hamlets and Dagenham. She didn’t know it at the time, but her teaching career would prepare her for performing stand-up comedy. “I’ve never been in a gig where somebody has tried to escape through my window! No one has ever stood up, faced the wall and gone, ‘Oh this is rubbish, I am not listening to this, when are you going to stop talking? When are you going to go home, when is this going to end?’ So when I started stand-up, I just thought, ‘This is really easy, everybody’s listening to me, everybody’s facing in the right direction, oh my God what am I going to do now?’” Less than a year into her stand-up career Shazia was thrust into the spotlight. It was in the wake of 9/11 and in a deadpan style she would joke: “My name is Shazia Mirza. At least, that’s what it says on my pilot’s licence.” It translated well internationally and she even became the subject of a CBS documentary. “It was like being on drugs – I didn’t know what I was doing. I just wanted to be a comedian. I was the only Asian woman doing stand-up comedy on the circuit at the time and I got a lot of attention for someone so new to stand-up. I felt, ‘That’s not me at all; I’m not even a comedian. I have, what, seven minutes of material?’ Stand-up comedy is not something that you think, ‘Right I’m going to do this,’ and then get good the next day.” Shazia strongly believes that comedy is something you have to work hard at and finesse, “It’s about grafting, going on the circuit for no money every night of the week, getting good, getting stage time. It’s something you actually have to do. You can’t sit up at home and read about it, you have to do it. It takes years to get good; it’s taken me twelve years to get good at what I do.” Summer 2016 No.44

12 Feature

Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve never been in a gig where somebody has tried to escape through my window!Â

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Gaining so much publicity so early on in her career led to resentment and a backlash among her comedy peers at the time. “I always wanted to be good at what I did. My work was really important to me, I was never in it for the money and there isn’t any money when you start off. I wasn’t desperate to be famous, I wanted to do good work and so the fact that I was catapulted really early was actually not my fault. “It did make me lose my confidence and I felt very isolated but I always knew that I want to be good at what I do so it was never an issue for me. I was going to carry on and get good at my work. So I just worked harder. I used to do three gigs a night, seven days a week, for years and years. I wanted to be as good as the profile I had and then I got really good. I feel like it’s all balancing out now.” Despite the attention, Shazia’s parents were not convinced by her career direction, it wasn’t a career they had either planned or expected. “They don’t think it’s a respectable thing to do for an Asian woman to go on stage and tell jokes. They just can’t get their head around this.” In the years that followed they have still not seen her perform her comedy live. Although as Shazia points out, stand-up comedy isn’t necessarily where you expect to see many 60 or 70 years olds hanging out. The nearest they came to it was a recent appearance on the Jonathan Ross Show when Shazia was essentially doing her latest stand-up while sitting down. Shazia has been touring The Kardashian’s Made Me Do It since February 2016 and when we met her she was on her third sell-out run at the Soho Theatre in London. She describes the show as being in four segments: political correctness, offence, ISIS and ‘Jihadi brides’, a reference to the east London school where four pupils left for Syria. “I did a lot of research and I spoke to a lot of people about the girls who left the UK to join ISIS. I spoke to a lot of women and we all agreed it was nothing to do with religion, it’s nothing to do with politics – they are fifteen and sixteen years old and it’s to do with sex. All my friends agreed and since I’ve been doing the show I’ve never had so many Muslim women email me and say, ‘Thank you for saying this, this is exactly the conversation me and my friends have in private but we can never have in public.’ “ I did it at the Edinburgh Festival as a work in progress, although it was pretty finished. Then I did it at the Tricycle Theatre in November for two weeks and it sold out. I’ve been on tour since 5th February and I’ve been sold-out. Not one person has written me a negative email or said, ‘I disagree with what you are saying.’ Summer 2016 No.44

14 Feature Opposite: Poster for The Kardashian’s Made Me Do It

It’s about grafting, going on the circuit for no money every night of the week.

“I think comedy is about the truth and when you are telling the rawest truth people just can’t argue with that. I think this is my most honest show and therefore it is my most funny show and I just think people can’t argue with this.” Shazia had intended to name the show The Road to Al-Baghdadi but not surprisingly the Tricycle Theatre had some reservations and it was changed. The new name is appropriate – in the show Shazia recollects the Home Affairs Select Committee who asked the schoolgirls’ relatives, ‘Why have your daughters gone to Syria?’ And the sister said, ‘I can’t understand why she’s gone, she used to watch The Kardashians.’ “So I turned that into the title, it’s something to do with the show but it’s not the title I wanted.” Shazia spends a lot of time visiting and working in America and would love to do a sitcom there. “My favourite is Curb Your Enthusiasm and I think Larry David is a genius. I would love to be in Louis CK’s sitcom. I’d also love to do some films and to write.” Over the years Shazia has had requests to write books and she has regularly contributed to newspapers and periodicals. However, she hasn’t wanted to rush writing. “I got pushed into the public domain when I wasn’t ready, I didn’t want to make that the same thing with my writing, I want to do it on my terms when I am ready and that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to write a book which people have Goldlink

been wanting me to do for ten years but it’s going to be about what I want it to be about.” To this day Shazia is frequently referred to as an ‘Asian comic’ or a ‘female, Asian comic.’ I asked her how she would bill herself if given the opportunity. “Well when I first started there was all that. They can’t just say ‘comic’, it’s always female and I was ticking so many other boxes. I was a Muslim, female, stand-up comedian from Birmingham. It was just so many labels and I thought, ‘My comedy isn’t about any of that really, it’s really just about me.’ “I would just want to be called a comedian. I fought against the labelling and pigeon-holing for so long and now finally I get to this point where I do get called a comedian. That makes me feel finally accepted for just being that. I was on Radio 4 recently and they interviewed me as ‘the comedian Shazia Mirza’ and I thought, ‘Wow, this is what I’ve wanted for twelve years!’ That means so much to me because that’s what I am.” Check when Shazia in next performing near you by visiting her website: shazia-mirza.com

One to Watch

Laia Gasch

Cultural producer, policy advisor, local activist and anthropologist. Originally from Barcelona, Laia Gasch (Drama and Theatre Arts, 1996) moved to London to study at Goldsmiths. An urban anthropologist, Laia has also been awarded a Masters in Anthropology of Development from SOAS. Laia has dedicated her professional life to leading national and international high-profile projects including award-winning Blast for the BBC, where she worked for over five years. She was a producer for the London 2012 Cultural Olympic and led a number of innovative projects including at the London International Festival of Theatre, Tate Modern and the Southbank Centre. Laia is currently a policy advisor for the Deputy Mayor for Education and Culture at the Mayor of London’s Office.

“L

ondon is at the top of its game culturally. It is the most visited city in the world. It leads in theatre, music, and film, and in museums and visual arts. However, London’s population growth is set to be 10 million by 2030 and international competition means the capital faces many challenges. As a policy advisor, I champion culture as a vital ingredient to making the capital a better city. I’m currently working on a proposal to

reverse the rapid loss of affordable studio space by working with developers and local authorities to ensure artists can live and work in London. We are also proposing new legislation to protect small music venues which requires any new residential development built next to a music venue to cover the costs of noise insulation ensuring live music and residents can live side by side. Finally, we’re looking at the creation of a new role, the Night Time Tsar, to ensure London can be a truly 24-hour city. What attracted me to London when I first came here was its dynamism. It’s a city in constant change, forever adapting to new ideas and people from around the world. I also admire the entrepreneurialism this city encourages – when my son was born I set up a parent-run nursery with some friends. The project was seen as an experiment, but it is still thriving 15 years on. I am also a local activist in Hackney

contributing in small ways – I am a firm believer that it is often in small acts of kindness that big changes happen. My time in London began at Goldsmiths and it is Goldsmiths that made me. I loved the left-field atmosphere of the campus, the committed and yet very relaxed energy of the lecturers and professors and the unstoppable raw vitality of the students. We were made to feel like the world belonged to us and it was a very liberating and empowering feeling. My friends spanned from across years and degrees. My classmates were a magic bunch – it was thrilling to be part of a group who wanted to make things and make things happen fast. I made friends for life here and many I am still in touch with – most of them work in the arts and creative industries. I feel very proud that we followed our passion and now dedicate our professional lives to what we love and believe in.” Summer 2016 No.44

16 Showcase

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17 The Life of the Party

The Life of the Party was exhibited at last year’s degree shows by alumna Hayley Connaughton (BA Fine Art, 2015). The degree shows are an eclectic programme of free exhibitions, shows and performances showcasing the exciting work of our latest graduates. Discover the very best emerging talent from a range of creative and innovative disciplines at venues across London this summer.

Until September 2016 at Goldsmiths in New Cross and across London. For more information: gold.ac.uk/ degree-shows

Summer 2016 No.44

18 Academic

DEAD WHEN I Mark Aitken from the Department of Media and Communications explains how he came to make a feature documentary about a Mexican asylum run by its own patients. Mark is an independent filmmaker and artist who lectures at Goldsmiths and Central Saint Martins, UAL. He is currently working on Sanctum Ephemeral, a photography book about how people inhabit their homes.

read Charles Bowden’s Murder City in 2011. The book is about Ciudad Juárez in Mexico, a city that frequently trumps Mogadishu as the world’s most violent. Juárez sits in the epicentre of global free trade, just across the border from the US. The most lucrative trade is drugs and guns, although clothes, machines and people are also sold. There is a character in Murder City called Miss Sinaloa who is dumped in a mental asylum in the desert run by its own patients. The crazy place, where the lunatics run the asylum. I want to know more about these people from the city of death who look at each other and ask what they can do to help. So I visit this asylum in the Goldlink

desert. A beleaguered promised land populated by outcasts. An asylum from the madness. I meet Pastor José Antonio Galván, an evangelical street preacher from Juárez. I don’t share his religious beliefs but he is one of those believers who works with the real problems. He isn’t waiting for a solution. His diagnosis is simple: these people are in trauma. The way forward is for them to help each other. I meet a man who lived on the streets and ate dead dogs. Two sisters found chained to the floor; their parents having never even taught them to speak. Questions about these people steep me in darkness and I am afraid. These people persist with their lives in spite of what remains best unimagined. They are the light that remains. I watch them churn the daily menial tasks. They welcome me and tell me their stories. No one asks me for anything because they have each other. Their bounty dissolves the line between us and them. I see this quickly and realise there is much to learn. I speak with Chuck Bowden about my visit. I show him sequences from a film I want to make there. He tells me that he has wanted to make the same film for years but could never find the money. A film about a place where, “… pain is distilled into 151% proof essence. The happiest and most contented people in Juárez are in the asylum and it is not because they are crazy. It is because they are

secure and surrounded by love.” I realise I’m not working with metaphors. I’m working with poetic facts. The flies and filth and deaths don’t symbolise anything. They are the product of a city that’s gone insane. It is all profoundly indelible. I spend the next four years making a film. A film about a mental asylum run by Mexicans in the desert doesn’t fit whatever agendas the money people have. They are generally appalled by what I show them and respond with disbelief and discomfort. I squeeze the sponge of care and concern and receive a dribble of pity. I discourage pity. My admiration for these transcendent untouchables is not shared.

These people persist with their lives in spite of what remains best unimagined. They are the light that remains. I realise I’m not working with metaphors. I’m working with poetic facts. The flies and filth and deaths don’t symbolise anything. They are the product of a city that’s gone insane. It is all profoundly indelible. Dead When I Got Here is the film that resulted from these visits to the asylum. The title given to me by a man describing his arrival at the place. He asked me to look for

GOT HERE his daughter in the US. They hadn’t seen each other for 25 years. Out of nowhere, the daughter contacted me after finding my trailer online. She wanted to know what her father was doing in a mental asylum after being told he was dead. The story transformed into a family reunion. Now the man has a new life with purpose. There are many more stories and they are accounted for in a book about the experience of working in the asylum. I often wondered what people in the asylum would make of themselves on screen. I imagined sitting under the desert stars where I made the film with everyone whooping and hollering at their apparitions. The actual event is, or course, far more prosaic.

About twenty patients watch the film in a room that leaks desert sunlight. Many of the people alive on the screen are now dead. One is a woman called Leticia. Her sister, Elia, also a patient, watches the film. I’m informed that she has no apparent awareness of her sister’s death. People stare and prod Elia whenever Leticia appears. Elia shows no recognition. People point and laugh at their likenesses. It feels like we’re watching a home movie. Perhaps that is enough. The film begins its life in the world and screens in New Mexico, California and Texas. One man says to me that the world will never be the same again. I return to London. Audiences are genuinely moved. Perhaps the void between us and them has been slightly narrowed.

Perhaps this is the affirmation that I have been seeking. Perhaps it is the one we all need. More screenings follow. 150,000 people view it on Dutch television. The film wins the main prize at the Scottish Mental Health festival and gets a special mention in Mexico City at DocsDF festival. These accolades may assure more screenings. A friend says to me that I should be happy with the success of the film. I am happy but the work continues. An independent filmmaker is very fortunate when their work fits the prescribed audience grabbing agendas of marketing types. They follow trends. Create artificial audiences. But consider why we so often feel short-changed after watching a film. Sales and marketing has sabotaged the potential for deeper meaning. The people in the asylum inspired me to see the world less complacently. The experience of incandescent lives lived with scarce comfort and precious little security made me uncomfortable. I saw and learned things beyond my imagination. My task was to translate my encounters into something more life-affirming than threatening. For you to find meaning in life lived with less fear of death. To inspire living that is less diluted, more essential Goldlink Presents: A Q&A with Director, Mark Aitken, following a screening of Dead When I Got Here for Goldsmiths alumni in October 2016. For more information about the film visit: deadwhenigothere.org Summer 2015 No.42

20 International

Become an Alumni Am b assador

We launched the Alumni Ambassador Programme in Athens in 2014. Since then we have established a global network of 43 volunteers representing 30 cities around the world. Each May, they collaborate to organise a week of events taking place around the world in just one week. All through the year they provide a link between Goldsmiths and local alumni.

LOS ANGELES

Shelaagh Ferrell (MA Drama: The Process of Production, 1996) is a British actress, singer, film producer and writer. She performed for many years in musicals and plays, and acted on TV, radio and film. More recently Shelaagh produced the movie, One Love, starring Idris Elba and Ky-mani Marley. Shelaagh moved to Los Angeles in 2010.

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ATHENS

Kostis Papadimitriou (MA Journalism, 1995) is an economist for SYRIZA Parliamentary Group in Athens. Kostis has previously worked for various national and international media in Greece, such as Kathimerini, Eleftherotypia and Dow Jones, as a financial journalist and columnist writing on financial markets, political economy and economic thought.

21 If you are relocating to a new city or are looking to network, do not hesitate to get in touch with your local Alumni Ambassador to share advice and expertise. Meet all of the Goldsmiths Alumni Ambassadors online: goldlink-online.com/ambassadors Would you like to be an Alumni Ambassador where you live? Get in touch to find out more: alumni@gold.ac.uk

Australia Brazil Canada Denmark Germany Ghana Greece

Hong Kong India Indonesia Ireland Italy Japan Singapore

Sweden Switzerland Taiwan Trinidad and Tobago United States

TOKYO

Satoko Noi (MA Media and Communications, 2005) misses the weekend bike rides to Burgess Park and saving abandoned old vinyl records in Deptford Market. She currently works as an acquisition editor in translation publishing at Mikasa-Shobo Publishers, and develops many foreign non-fictions into Japanese language.

JAKARTA

Nin Djani Atmodipoero (BA Media and Communications, 2013) is a writer and digital communication specialist. Recollecting Goldsmiths she says: “I didn’t leave with just a degree but also, most importantly, a different – more open – perspective towards life and its idiosyncrasies.”

Summer 2016 No.44

22 Feature

MATHS, MUSIC AND SO MUCH MORE Eska Mtungwazi’s career is less conventional than most. She is a singer, a song writer and a primary school teacher. She’s an innovative choir director with an interest in fashion and film. And she has a Maths and Statistics degree from Goldsmiths. Who knows what Eska will do next?

What would you consider the biggest turning point in your career? I think the big turning point was setting up my own label in 2013. Thinking about me releasing my own music was a real shift in my mind-set in terms of how I would use myself not only as an artist, but as a businessperson and wanting to know that side of the industry. I thought long and hard about the creative process, and it was very important to have a clear strategy and control about how that was going to be presented in public. I felt the best way to do that would be to give myself my own platform, which then tells my story in the way that I needed it to be told. In collaboration I wasn’t so much in control because those weren’t projects that I led on. It was really important for my solo work to have a home, to have a platform that I built myself. How did it feel to be nominated for the Mercury Prize last year? It’s the one award, of all the awards, that I have paid the most attention to over the years because it seems to recognise the creative achievements of quite diverse bodies of work. From classical through to jazz, contemporary pop music; it just seems to be looking anywhere and everywhere for that creative spark, and I connected with that. Goldlink

Also, having contributed to three Mercury nominated albums in the past, it’s great to be recognised as an artist not just a musical collaborator or contributor. It was a very proud moment for me. How has the nomination impacted on your subsequent career? The first immediate and obvious impact was the interest there was around the nomination and in my music. My Spotify listenership went up by 300% or 3000%! Also, interest from within the industry increased. Something that was also heart-warming for me was other artists and contemporary peers suddenly being aware of my music and being interested. Feeling like your community, your creative community, has expanded – that has been phenomenal. I’m reaping from that this year, certainly doing a lot more festivals than I’ve ever done before. There’s greater promoter interest and it’s allowing me to present my music on a wider variety of platforms and at more mainstream festivals. I’m getting to do shows that are a bit more interesting, collaborations that are a bit more exciting. I’m doing Music Tech Fest in Berlin, which is artists and technologists collaborating together to create a new sound, a new instrument and thinking about new music technology. I’ve got my Roundhouse show on 18 August, which

Summer 2016 No.44

24 Feature is part of Roundhouse’s Curtain Call series. So I’m getting to collaborate with a 360-degree curtain projection installation that has been designed by Ron Arad, the celebrated architect and designer. I’ll be able to give a whole sound and visual experience of my album. In many ways I’m considering that the finale to this album cycle. I thought it would be an incredibly fitting way to celebrate the journey I’ve been on. So yes, it’s opening up opportunities that I wouldn’t have been able to have before. Studying for a degree in Mathematics and Statistics must seem a world away from touring Europe and being nominated for a Mercury award! Did you enjoy studying maths? It’s great to be able to challenge myself and use a different part of my brain. Human beings aren’t just one thing, mathematical or musical, human beings are a variety of things. I’m very fortunate to have been able to use my brain in one particular way and in another season, use it in another. The music actually inspires me to think about doing new things and explore my creativity in other ways. I’ve never had my eyes set on it being a specific thing. I was doing it because I enjoyed it and it was good to have my mind on another thing whilst at the same time I was doing music.

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How did you first get involved in the Goldsmiths Vocal Ensemble? That was because of the brilliant Simon Deacon, who lectures on the course. Simon gets it and he gets it from both an academic and practical point of view. Imagine doing a popular music degree, you wonder how on earth anyone can prepare someone for the music industry from an academic point of view. Simon has been brilliant in the way he has got so many working artists involved on the popular music course and coming in as visiting lecturers. When Simon offered this position to me, I felt quite upset because in some ways, I felt out of my depth. Even though I come from a choir background in school and church, I wasn’t really sure what I would do in terms of leading the choir, what the repertoire would be or what the presentation would be. Over my seven years there the Goldsmiths Vocal Ensemble began to find its shape through the artists that we started to collaborate with, not only music artists but also choreographers and movement directors. We had the privilege of working with Struan Leslie who was then the Royal Shakespeare Company Movement Director. We’ve also had the privilege of working with the likes of Matthew Herbert, and I collaborated with the choir on one of my own works

Mathematical or musical, human beings are a variety of things. I’m very fortunate to have been able to use my brain in one particular way and in another season use it in another.

called English Skies. Over the years, we started to find our own language, and the big task for me was to try and find a new way of presenting choirs or choral ideas within the popular music genre. Often the choir can just be a big massive body swaying in the background adding volume in terms of numbers and sound but, actually, a choir can be far more dynamic than that. We were starting to use Greek theatre ideas to try and find a way of bringing dynamism into the choral presentation. It’s been a really exciting journey exploring the ways in which contemporary choirs present music, in new innovative ways. When you were making the album was there a point where you thought you’d really made something special? I think every artist feels that way. You’ve got to get to a point where you can let music go and be confident that you’ve made a statement of merit, by whatever criteria you’re assessing that merit for yourself, and you put that out with a bit of confidence and a bit of drive. I had to at least put out a record with my name on it that I had confidence and pride in, and that no matter what the response would be, I would still have made something that I was proud of.

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26 Retrospectives You only live around the corner from us at Goldsmiths, what’s your favourite thing about South East London? I have a little one and my parents are only around the corner in Hither Green. I’ve seen the transformation of South East London over the years. There’s a real creative hub and the universities and colleges surrounding have a big part to play in the creative revival of South East London. Because of Goldsmiths, because of Trinity Laban, Greenwich, Camberwell Art College we’re seeing these wonderful creative hubs, and also having students who then graduate and live in the area and continue their creative practice. It has really brought a huge transformation, and for me I can see that in New Cross, Deptford and Peckham Rye. You’ve got a café that is also an art gallery and does children’s events. People really put their creative thinking cap on to bring vibrant services to the community that are quite broad. I feel very fortunate to have local arts communities around me that have been very supportive, like Goldsmiths, and like The Albany, where I’m an Associate Artist. Places that are local to me that can impact my life and where I can impact the lives of others as well. I’ve got an amazing way for art to continue, for that to happen within your own vicinity is a very special thing.

Goldlink

If there anywhere in particular you love to perform, place you feel most comfortable? I genuinely love new audiences. I mean that for me, the location doesn’t really interest me unless its specific to the kind of performance I want to do. What actually interests me is meeting a new audience, especially an audience who has never heard of me or heard very little about what I do. Then you feel the performer has to rise to the challenge as well as persuading these people and winning them over. There’s a real thrill there, I love that. Is there anything else that you’d like to try or use as a means to express your creativity in the future? Film is something that interests me – film, fashion and design. Making moving images to accompany the music I make. I performed and was part of making the music for Rick Owens’ Women’s Show at Paris Fashion Week, which definitely got me more interested in that whole world. Being a visual learner, when I make music I’m often seeing things as well as hearing things so it seems quite natural for me to want to make visual things as well Eska is on tour, visit eskaonline.com to find out more.

Life After Goldsmiths

Maria Court (MA Creating Social Media, 2012) Rosemarie Lerner (MA Creative and Cultural Entrepreneurship, 2012) Sebastian Melo (MA Digital Media: Technology and Cultural Form, 2011) Ewan Cass-Kavanagh (MA Creating Social Media, 2012)

The Quipu Project is a transmedia documentary that makes visible the stories of 272,000 women and 21,000 men who were sterilised in Peru in the mid-1990s as a way of reducing poverty. Thousands claimed sterilisation happened without their consent, but until now they have been repeatedly silenced and denied justice. The project was developed by alumni filmmakers Maria Court, Rosemarie Lerner and Sebastian Melo along with fellow alumnus and creative technologist Ewan Cass-Kavanagh. “We came together in 2013 after completing our degrees, and we decided to pitch together for the REACT Future Documentary programme, a Bristol based AHRC funded R&D scheme. We shared a common approach, one that allowed to us to respond critically to the brief of digital innovation in the field of interactive documentary.” An interplay between a low-tech telephone line and a high-tech digital interface, the Quipu Project enables communities that are politically, geographically and digitally marginalised to tell their stories in their own words. A phone call allows them to record their story into a growing audio archive, which is displayed and shared with the world through an interactive documentary website. The project has gained wide international recognition after launching at IDFA DocLab in Amsterdam, including features by BBC, The Guardian, The New York Times, El Pais and many others. It recently received the Nominet Trust 100 award and the Prix Ars Electronica honorary mention, recognising it as an original innovation in the form of documentary as well as a powerful method of establishing dialogue and enabling a global community of support The project is live at quipu-project.com

Summer 2016 No.44

28 Feature

Goldlink

Following collaborations with producer Kwes, as well as the Invisible’s Dave Okumu, Rosie Lowe (BMus Popular Music, 2011) released her debut album, Control, in February this year. Having recently completed a European tour, Rosie has performances lined up at On Blackheath and Bestival at Goldsmiths. Simon Deacon, Director of Popular Music, recently met Rosie to talk about how she came to release her first album.

CREATIVE CONTROL I

t has been five years since Rosie last sat in Simon’s office and it was under very different circumstances. Back then, she sat down and said ‘I don’t know what I’m doing.’ It was just before Easter in 2011 when she was working towards her degree show. A few months later she had written a completely new set from scratch. A lot has happened in the subsequent years, from getting a publishing deal to releasing her critically acclaimed debut album, Control. However, after leaving Goldsmiths Rosie wasn’t sure what she was going to do in the long-term. All she knew was that she wanted to carry on writing music. Rosie rented a flat nearby and soundproofed her bedroom to use as a studio. This meant sleeping on the landing but it also meant she could write music whenever there was time. When she finished a few months later, she put it all on a soundcard to share with friends. The goal wasn’t to secure a record deal. For Rosie, it was closure – a way of moving on to do something else. Working with former classmate Caragh Campbell (BMus Popular Music, 2012) on drums, she did a few gigs and was quickly offered a deal with Domino Publishing. She spent the advance on making an EP with Dave Okumu (The Invisible) and Kwes, a producer and writer from Lewisham. “My goal was just to get music out. Then once I’d actually done it, I licensed it to 37 Adventures, a little record label. They left me to my own devices and they just supported it.”

Significantly, Rosie then became the only artist to ever get play-listed on 6 Music, 1Xtra and Radio 1. The result was interest from a range of major record labels although Rosie hankered after an independent label. It was only at the last minute that Paul Epworth signed Rosie after Dave Okumu played him her music in a session. Rosie signed to Paul’s label Wolf Tone providing Rosie with the best of both worlds (Wolf Tone is licensed to Polydor Records). Rosie went on to write the majority of her first album including the single, Woman, in Devon where she grew up. The other 20% came from sessions with Machinedrum, Jam City and a duo called Fred and Fabian. Working at home meant packing up her studio but Rosie took as little down to Devon as possible – a rationale that dates back to a composition course she took with Pete Astor at Goldsmiths. “You had to write three songs with a limitation, and mine was to just use my recorded vocals.” This was the first time Rosie had produced herself and it was a transformative experience. “When I put the limitation down of just using my vocals and I could sing what I was hearing, it felt like that was the best way. I still write that way, most of the time. “If you’re influenced by something it doesn’t mean that’s what you have to sound like. As I started doing the vocal stuff I totally got that – it was for the first time in three years. I loved my time at Goldsmiths and I wouldn’t be where I’m at now without it, but I did Summer 2016 No.44

30 Feature connected to. I always imagined I would then sit down with a glass of wine and write my track listing in a night. It took me about four months of absolute hell. I was listening to them every day thinking ‘Oh no, that’s not working.’ Albums are very important to me. They’ve got to feel like a body of work. I think there’s a way that it works out. You’ve just got to be open to it.” The name of the album emerged through the theme of the lyrics. “I was writing out the lyrics and they had ‘control’ in 80 or 90% of the songs. I thought ‘I’m repeating myself and that’s really bad.’ Then I thought control is definitely something I’ve been dealing with the last few years. Trying to relinquish control and trusting people and not trying to control everything.” Rosie has also had to relinquish some control when performing. “I think if you don’t enjoy playing live you’ve got to find a way of enjoying it. I didn’t have much compassion for myself in terms of sounding natural but I watched gigs and people do stuff wrong all time. They can sing the whole thing out of tune but if they’re present it doesn’t really matter. I’m not like someone who’s going to dance on stage in six-inch heels and look really pretty. I look ugly when I sing! I just want it to be about the music. So that’s something that I’ve had to find, but I think that we’ve got there.” It took Rosie all three years of the programme to feel like her moment had come, and with that in mind, struggle, because I felt like everyone was on a path. I felt like my path was between these different genres. It just didn’t feel quite right.” When unsure where to take her final project it was being at home that proved pivotal. Her brother encouraged her to go back to the same technique of using just her voice and the production and it worked. “I came out of university, after my final performance, and it felt like I’d found something that fit me. It was the first time that I’d performed my own music on stage and I felt at home. That was a big moment for me.” Devon continues to offer Rosie the space to work and also the space to be entirely honest, which has been a significant aspect of Control. “If I was not doing this professionally I would be writing these songs anyway, and I really believe that. It’s just my output. “When I went back to Devon I felt like all comparisons and the stuff that stunts creativity just started to fade away. I didn’t have any time pressure and I wasn’t putting so much pressure on myself. I could just go on a walk if I couldn’t do it. It was really important that I went home and just had some peace to be able to know what was going on.” Although, it wasn’t producing or selecting the songs for the album that proved difficult – the hardest part was choosing the running order. “The songs that came forward were pretty quick actually, just because they’re the ones that I felt Goldlink

The biggest thing I learned was to put limitations on myself. she would advise future students to use the time to explore and to try everything. “It’s the perfect time to try what you wouldn’t normally. Once you’ve left it’s a lot harder to do that. The biggest thing I learned was to put limitations on myself.” Putting limitations on yourself may sound counterintuitive but for Rosie it is those limitations that encourage her to find new ways to write and produce music. “The point is you’ve got three really key years to explore yourself and your sound. You can’t put that into money or words, really. I just think it’s very rare that you get that. I wish I’d practised more. I wish I could do it again, now. The relationships you form here stay with you forever. I feel really lucky to have found a friendship group and a musical understanding.” For more information and for forthcoming performances, visit: rosielowe.com

Original Works If you would like to submit a book or another original work, such as a film or music, we would be happy to consider it for inclusion in the magazine or on our website: gold.ac.uk/alumni

THE UNFORGOTTEN

Laura Powell It’s 1956 and 15-year-old Betty Broadbent has never left the Cornish fishing village of St Steele or ventured far beyond the walls of the boarding house run by her erratic mother. But when the London press pack descends to report on a series of gruesome murders of young women, Betty’s world changes. In particular, she is transfixed by mysterious and aloof reporter, Mr Gallagher. As the death toll rises, an unlikely friendship blossoms between Betty and Gallagher. But as their bond deepens, they find themselves entangled with the murders and each is forced to make a devastating choice, one that will shape their own lives – and the life of an innocent man – forever. The Unforgotten makes for a gripping debut novel from Laura Powell (MA Journalism, 2008).

HARMATTAN

Gavin Weston Gavin Weston (BA Fine Art, 1984) is an artist and designer from Ireland and an ambassador to the London based NGO FORWARD, which campaigns to end child marriage and FGM. Harmattan is Gavin’s first novel and it is based on his first hand experiences of Niger and its people. It tells the story of Haoua, a young girl growing up in a remote village in the Republic of Niger. Her home life is a stable one with a loving mother and an elder brother she adores. But for Haoua, there are new storm clouds on the horizon. As civil strife mounts in Niger, Haoua begins to fear for her brother’s safety and at home, her father makes plans that will undoubtedly threaten the stability she has previously known.

SUPERSTRUCTURAL BERLIN

Nicolas Hausdorf & Alexander Goller Superstructural Berlin: A Superstructural Tourist Guide to Berlin for the Visitor and the New Resident is co-authored by Nicolas Hausdorf (MA International Studies, 2011) and Alexander Goller. Described by Nicolas as ‘a sort of gonzo-style subversive coffee table book for the stoic and critical connoisseur gentleman and woman’, it is an experimental sociology of the city of Berlin. A mix of pamphlet-polemic, cultural critique and weird colourful mapping enterprise, it tries to investigate the city as a series of infrastructures: drugs, nightclubs, arts, new economy and tourism. It provides an insider’s journey through contemporary Berlin and its emerging social and economic discourses.

EXPLORING THE PRODUCTION OF URBAN SPACE

Michael Edema Leary-Owhin The ideas of Henri Lefebvre on the production of urban space have become increasingly useful for understanding worldwide post-industrial city transformation. Michael Edema Leary-Owhin (PhD Sociology, 2011) uses new international comparative research to engage critically with Lefebvre’s spatial theories and challenge recent thinking about the nature of urban space. The book contributes critically to the post-industrial city comparative analysis literature. It provides an accessible guide for those who care about cities, public space, city planning and urban policy.

Summer 2016 No.44

32 Parting Shot

Hockey & Rugby 1908

These photos were sent in by T.H. Abbott, whose parents both attended Goldsmiths. His father Tom studied at Goldsmiths from 1906–1908 and his mother Dorothy Abbott (née Wadmore) attended a full decade later, between the years of 1916–1918. His sister Pauline Abbott is also an alumna and left Goldsmiths in 1953. More than 100 years later and Goldsmiths remains committed to its students undertaking extracurricular activities. Starting in the next academic Goldlink

year, Wednesday afternoons will be lecture-free to allow students the time to incorporate sports, societies and any other beneficial activities into their timetables. Discussing the significance of this step, Goldsmiths Students’ Union President, Danny Nasr said: “Activities are an integral component to student life in any campus. They curate the education experience with activism, sport, community and social consciousness.”