Family Celebration Day: A Museum Takeover

Studio

What does home look, sound, smell and feel like to you? Who do you share your home with? What makes it unique?

Discover the power of zine-making to reflect on and share your own experiences of home! Taking inspiration from the vibrant textures, patterns and colours in our new Hackney rooms sets, families are invited to make a zine with Sahra that tells their own sensory and personal stories of home.

Studio

One of the star objects from the contemporary home is a swan sculpture folded out of lottery tickets given to the Museum by a Vietnamese family in Hackney. Fold and play with paper, to make your own paper animal heirlooms to take away.

Discovery Garden

“Three Sisters” is an Indigenous American planting technique where squash, beans and maize (corn) are planted together to provide each plant with the support that it needs to grow.

Using plants to think about family structures, this workshop will weave tales of farming, kinship and creation. With the introduction of the garden space and repurposed oil drum jerk pan to Michael McMillan’s ‘West Indian Front Room’ at the Museum, participants will celebrate regenerative ways of caring for the land and for our families.

Learning Pavilion

Children can make their own temporary homes in our Mini Playhouse! Squat at the museum for a little while and make a den using sensory materials, colours and textures. Once you’ve finished, leave the story of your den behind for other children to hear, read and be inspired by!

Read the co-design story of our Mini Playhouse here. 

Get hands-on with our seven new rooms, from A Townhouse in 1878 to A Converted Flat in 2049, experience the sights, sounds, and scents of different eras!

Atrium

Relax with a calming kora performance suitable for all ages.

Rooms Through Time: 1878-2049

Come by for the opportunity to touch and interact with museum objects from the new Rooms Through Time gallery. This session is led by a member of our Collections team who will provide range of prompts to encourage sensory interaction with objects from our collection.  

Lawns

Learn how to play simple traditional songs from southern Africa on Marimbas! The workshop will include a bit of traditional singing and dancing too. Then share what you have learnt in a mini performance!

Gardens Through Time

Join us for a live story telling of the Winter Melon, by story teller Ashley Allyman. After the tale, explore our new British Vietnamese home and see if you can find the Winter Melon.

Winter Melon synopsis

Two friends Sammy and Davey spend the summer days with Sammy’s grandma, Poh Poh. They visit Poh Poh’s garden every day, eager to pick the winter melon and help Poh Poh make her special winter melon soup. When the melon is nearly ripe for harvest, Sammy follows her own plans, discovering one of Poh Poh’s most important ingredients for winter melon soup

Gardens Through Time

Inspired by the shapes and textures of the Gardens Through Time, watch a mythical performance by young people from Thrive Dance Youth Company.

Choreography by Sarah Poekert in collaboration with the dancers, Gabriela Demetriou, Elzbieta Stettner and Elisa Wallbank.

Lawns

Have you ever seen a bubble that glows or smokes? Join us for a performance by Olena Nesterenko to see with your own eyes!

Ashley is a professional actor. He trained at The Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts. His credits include: 

Theatre – The Cobbled Streets Of Geneva (EllandarProductions); Rice Paper Tales (Trikhon Theatre); Tempest (Terra Nova Belfast); Half n Half The Musical (Wales Millennium Centre); Yeh Shen (Polka Theatre); Arabian Nights (Sherman Cymru); Philip Pullman’s Grimm Tales (Shoreditch Town Hall) The Storyteller (The Etcetera Theatre); The Firework-Maker’s Daughter (Theatre By The Lake, Keswick); The King and I (Theatre At The Mill, Belfast); Skin (Arcola Theatre); The Full Monty (The Compass Theatre); Boom (Riverside Studios); Wave (Greenwich); Monkey In The Stars (Polka Theatre); The Jungle Book (The Bull Theatre) 

Television/Film – The Crown (Netflix); Casualty (BBC); Relic (BBC); Live Like Us; Healthy; Slashimi; Big Tingz 

Radio – Inspector Chen (BBC) 

Commercial -  Aviva (UK); Combos (USA, Australia); Emartel (Malaysia); Twisties (Malaysia) 

Josephina Kwando-Yaa (JK) Abuah is a North-West London-born Ghanaian multisensory artist, researcher, chef and grower. Inspired by their family's growing tradition in the Western region of Ghana, JK honours how farming breathes life into both miniature and large-scale worlds, particularly through food. Entangled with a dedication to academia, activism and archival work, Abuah uses food-centred interactive art to educate, mobilise and remember

Thrive Dance Youth Company: provides classes in North London where young people ages 12 - 19 can study contemporary dance and choreography in a creative and supportive environment. The company helps to inspire young people along their journey to becoming young dancers, artists, and performers. Thrive educates and supports future generations of young dancers by enabling creative thinking and inspiring self-confidence. 

Elisa Wallbank has been dancing ever since she was little, and this has always been a big passion of hers. She joined Thrive this year and has done multiple shows with her school, competing at the London Youth Games and performing at Cadogan Hall. She takes performing arts classes with Solestar and dances at the Centre for Advanced Training at The Place. She can’t wait to see where her dance journey takes her in the future.

Elzbieta Stettner has been dancing in Thrive for 2 years, as well as in the Step Into Dance youth company and at the Place's Centre for Advanced Training. In September, Ela will be starting professional training at Northern School of Contemporary Dance. Her goal is to join a dance company and tour and perform nationally/internationally.

Gabriela Demetriou has been dancing since the age of 3 and has been with Thrive Youth Dance Company for 2 years. She trains every week at The Centre for Advanced Training at The Place, Central School of Ballet and is currently preparing for the final stages of the London Youth Games with her school competition troupe. Gabriela is hoping to be a professional dancer and teacher in the future

Otto Gumaelius is a London based, Botswana raised, percussionist specialising in the Kwanongoma marimba and mbira nyunga nyunga of southern Africa. He writes and performs with his band Otto & The Mutapa Calling, and teaches music from Zimbabwe, South Africa and Botswana through his cultural arts and events company, Taste of Southern Africa.

www.ottogumaelius.com 

Olena Nesterenko, is a Ukrainian bubble show artist. She moved to England two years ago and was inspired to pick up her beloved craft of bubble performance.

Olena’s mission is to bring people bright emotions and unforgettable memories. Her bubble performances amaze and captivate audiences of all ages. From the tiniest bubbles to giant orbs, with special effects involving smoke, light, and fire!

Malick Kouyate was born in Casamance Senegal, west Africa, a region commonly known for its traditional sacred music. He belongs to the griot family of Cissoko, a specially selected group by the Mandeb Empire Emperor, who chose them to play, fabricate and guard the wisdom of the kora and the drums since the 13th century. The instruments played by his family were believed to create a direct connection with God, thus, to be played only by the chosen. For this reason, every boy born into or given to the Cissoko family has always been raised as a musician – a kora player and often a drummer. Malick started to play kora at the age of 5 under his grandfather’s guidance Massen Cissoko, an internationally renowned kora master.  Following his family’s legacy, Malick is a celebrated Kora player.

In 2007 Malick co-founded a band called ‘Kamben Kefo’ meaning Reunion. He has been touring and playing internationally with his band as well as other various bands and individuals across west Africa. In early 2017 as part of the AsuKa Tendeng Family, they were selected for the Grand Prix du President de la Republique de Senegal, and awarded 4th place among artists from west Africa later in December 2017. 

In addition to performing, he also teaches workshops. He has raised and trained many young musicians many of whom are now accomplished drummers and performers. Malick moved to London in 2018 and has taken part in multiple festivals and concerts around UK. Over the past four years he has become a highlight of the Southbank Busking Scene in London, supported by Arts Council.