POP-Talks Live
POP-Talks Live is back with a fourth series of live interviews with some friends of Poplar Union! Each fortnight join us on Instagram Live where Beth will be joined by a special guest discussing a whole range of topics. Get in touch with your questions!
COMING UP
Wednesday 16 June at 6pm – Pierre Bureau
Beth will be chatting to Pierre, a local photographer and workshop facilitator, about the power of photography as an accessible tool for a healthy mind.
Wednesday 30 June at 6pm – Joseph Lynch
This week, Beth will be speaking with director of Babel Theatre, Joseph Lynch about creativity and mental health for boys’ and men.
TBC – Refugee Week: Creativity and Conflict with mandla rae & Meduulla
For this year’s Refugee Week, Beth will be chatting to mandla rae and Meduulla who have been doing a placement at Imperial War Museum, through which they have curated a hiphop piece by Meduula, which explores land reform in Zimbabwe, and will be launched by IWM on 14 June.
About mandla rae
mandla rae is a Black, Zimbabwean, agender and queer writer and performer. Obsessed with archives and storytelling, they make work that draws from their personal experiences and heritage. They are currently on the Refugee Week Leadership Project and are undertaking a placement with Imperial War Museums as part of their development. mandla has been commissioned by many organisations across the country including the BFI, Journeys Festival International and Gay Times to make written works. They are currently an Associate Artist with Outbox Theatre.
Meduulla
Meduulla is a 21-year-old Zimbabwean-born artist raised in Manchester, UK. At the age of 13, she began writing poetry and became part of the Manchester-based collective ‘Young Identity’, where she honed her writing craft. When she moved to London at 18 to study French and Film Studies at university, she began releasing rap freestyles on her twitter page. The freestyles brought people’s attention to her first remix ‘Worldly eyes’ on YouTube, where she showcased her multilingual abilities. The positive reception of this song later led her to release her debut single ‘Levelled Up’ in January 2021. Among other achievements, Meduulla has performed at the See My World Festival in commemoration of the Panafrican congress, spoken at the 2020 Black Lives Matter Manchester Marches, and represented The Beautiful Resistance Campaign with Love Music, Hate Racism. She is eager to continue using her voice and her craft to push pertinent conversations to the forefront.
PREVIOUS INTERVIEWS
Rosie Eugenia Nkiruka Okotcha
This Earth Day, Beth will be chatting to Rosie, an advocate for sustainable fashion, discussing the impact the fashion industry has on the environment and ways we can still wear clothes we love without having to buy new.
Sarah Humphreys from ELOP
To honour this year’s IDAHOBIT (The International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia), Beth will be speaking with chair of ELOP (East London Out Project), Sarah Humphrys, discussing the great work the charity does for local LGBT communities.
Beth will be talking with Mikey and Margot from The People Speak, an Art Collective based in Aberfeldy Street, Poplar which specialises in bringing people together to be creative and share perspectives. Best known for Talkaoke, their latest project is called Inverse Apprentice, provoked by an absolute disdain for the values inherent in the TV show, The Apprentice. Instead of encouraging participants to compete against each other to win favour with the boss, the project seeks to find a way for a diverse group of participants to be productive together.
You can catch up on all of our POP-Talks Live interviews on our IGTV.
